Night
by annamatrix
Summary: Together again.
1. Night

Night

A soft whisper of cold and a faint ticklish feeling brought a tall, blonde woman from dreamless slumber to the brink of consciousness. Instant panic lashed through her brain - _ice_! Her heart began to beat painfully fast. It was only as she tried to open her eyes to see what damage her power had wrought that Elsa belatedly realized that what she had felt falling across her face and brushing her ear was neither snow nor ice, but rather a strand of her sister's hair. Panic gave way to confusion as full consciousness crept upon her and she realized there was no evidence that her power had manifested at all. She registered the sensation of weight against her side, the warmth of a body next to hers, an arm draped over her waist and the steady whisper of another pair of lungs breathing in and out.

Only then did she remember that her beloved Anna had refused to let her out of her sight, to the point of snuggling her to sleep. That hold was so reassuring, made her feel so _safe_. She'd fallen asleep almost immediately. And Anna was still there, still holding her. The redhead remained fast asleep despite Elsa's moment of fear, and now the queen of Arendelle felt like laughing with pure joy, seeing Anna drooling on the pillow in her slack-jawed slumber. Not wanting to wake her sister, Elsa chose to instead nestle a little closer to her. No immunity from cold was going to stop her from basking in the simultaneously intense and gentle warmth of Anna's presence.

Unable to fall asleep again quite so easily even in this perfect place, her head resting on Anna's shoulder, Elsa allowed herself a moment to actually stop and think about everything that'd happened. For so many years, she'd lived in fear of letting herself feel anything at all. Now that she'd realized it was that very fear which had caused all the trouble, the sheer relief and the sense of _freedom_ was like being able to breathe for the first time. And Anna! _Anna saved my life... It was all my fault, and she almost-_ She couldn't even finish the thought. She buried her face in Anna's shoulder, holding back tears. How could she ever have shut Anna out? Her stubbornly loyal, faithful Anna. But even the guilt and the shame lasted only a fleeting moment, overwhelmed by pure happiness. Elsa had her sister back at last. She couldn't even feel foolish for not realizing before that this was how it always should have been. All that mattered was she knew it now. Everything was going to be alright.

Basking in Anna's closeness, Elsa began to drift off again. She sighed softly, and her breath, gently cold as a single snowflake, drifted along the skin of Anna's neck. At this tiny sensation, Anna shifted in her sleep. Elsa abruptly found herself being held tighter than she would've thought possible - Anna was stronger than she looked! Elsa couldn't complain, though. Having Anna _keeping_ her here, not letting her run in fear again, was a blessing. It felt pretty wonderful, too. Anna's arms were crossed over each other, her hands clasped together just under Elsa's breasts. Her legs were tangled up in Elsa's, literally - Anna's toes had gotten caught in holes in the pattern of Elsa's nightgown. If Elsa tried to stand up now, she'd end up in a very awkward state indeed, but this was the last thing on her mind. She could hear Anna's very much un-frozen heart beating steadily. The sound thrummed through her entire body, deeply soothing. Her breathing slowed to match it, and her eyes slowly closed. Soon, the queen was asleep again, content for the first time in many years.

* * *

Unaware that her sister had been awake only minutes before, Anna had no idea what had taken her from the realm of a strange dream about the fireplace she'd laid freezing before only hours ago. Hans wasn't in the dream, or Olaf; it was just her and the fire, and she couldn't help staring into it. Something about the dancing flames was capturing her attention in a way she couldn't quite escape. But something had shaken her awake at last. She opened her eyes to find she had Elsa all but crushed up against her, the young woman's platinum blonde hair draped over Anna's back, head resting on her shoulder and a tiny smile on her perfect lips.

Anna clearly remembered insisting that Elsa stay with her tonight, secretly terrified that her sister's fear would overcome all the day's discoveries and leave her with nothing but a door once again closed in her face. She remembered Elsa putting up very little resistance. She remembered the swiftness with which her sister had fallen asleep in her arms. In those moments, Anna was immediately lost in old memories of happy times and waking skies, though she was sure _something_ was missing. Then she'd fallen asleep too, acutely aware of the soft coolness of Elsa's body against her own. It was just wonderful. No other word fit the sensation.

Now, Elsa wasn't just close, she was as close as close could be - Anna was holding her so tightly that she was delightfully conscious of every inch of her sister's form. Her hands trembled ever so slightly as she realized they were folded just under Elsa's bosom. Her legs were tingling with the feeling of skin on skin. It was all simply heavenly. And this was _real_, not just another lonely dream. This was Elsa physically here, all snuggled up in bed with her! From the moment she realized where Elsa's fear had come from, it had never again occurred to Anna to resent being turned away for so long. All she could feel was wild joy at being with Elsa again. Even the nagging worry that Elsa would try to run couldn't get to her. It was everything she'd ever dreamed of - _answers_! And Elsa. Mostly Elsa. The loneliness had gotten to her more than she'd realized.

Looking at it all again now, with Elsa having willingly given herself over to Anna's desperate clinging, she had to admit the truth to herself. It wasn't fear that Elsa would shut her out again that had led her to demand this shared bed. It was so much simpler than that. She wanted to be near Elsa. She wanted it so badly she couldn't bear it. There was no way the few hours of skating and laughter and chocolate they'd had could even _begin_ to make up for so many years apart. Seeing Elsa in her arms now, feeling this impossibly intense closeness, she knew she couldn't make herself let go if she tried. She didn't know whether to laugh, or cry, or bury her face in Elsa's beautiful hair and just sob with sheer happiness. It would have been more than worth being forever frozen just to know that Elsa would be safe, and instead she had Elsa back. She had Elsa back. _I have Elsa back._ The thought kept running over and over through her head and she didn't tire of it for a second.

Then Anna noticed the smile on Elsa's lips, and a whole new thrill of delight ran from the top of her head to the tips of her toes. Elsa was happy too. Nothing else could have made it better, but there it was. The princess hugged Elsa even tighter, a faint whimper of sheer feeling escaping her lips. It wasn't quite like her to be so still; usually she'd have so much energy that just being awake at all would be an excuse to run around every which way and get into every bit of mischief imaginable. Especially now that she had Elsa again. She could go sledding with Kristoff, play games with Olaf, even draw Hans' face on something so she could punch it again. But something about being here with her sister, just like this, was even more fulfilling. Try as she might, Anna couldn't want anything but to stay right where she was. She nuzzled at her sister gently. Every tiny motion, each fleeting touch, made the happiness more intense, until she felt so much joy inside that she thought she might burst.

She untangled her hand from its place and threaded her fingers through Elsa's beautiful hair. Everything about Elsa was so beautiful. What had she ever seen in that Hans? This was so different, and so much better. Being so close to Elsa should have been stiflingly hot, but Elsa's body was just the right amount of cold. Even the air around her smelled like snow, like Olaf but with less carrot and more- well, more Elsa! It was so soothing, and in a strange way it felt as elegant as Elsa herself. Anna's eyes started to shut again. It actually felt safe to sleep. Elsa wasn't getting out of this snuggle any time soon, that was for darn sure. All the questions Anna still had could wait, and Elsa would still be there, and just that was almost as good by itself as all the rest. The redhead rested her head against Elsa's with a grin and a soft "mm" sound. She was asleep again not long after.


	2. Morning

Soft rays of sunlight drifted through the window, shining in patterns upon the bedsheets. As the earliest hours of dawn gave way to full-on morning, the spattering of light crawled across the bed until it began to warm the cheek of the rather disheveled redhead mostly hidden beneath the covers. The small heat induced the girl to roll over, away from the window. This had the overall effect of landing her entirely atop the other girl in the bed.

Until that point, Elsa had been just as asleep as her sister, but having an Anna roll over on top of her was a bit jarring. She squirmed her way out from under as best she could, and tried to shove Anna the rest of the way off. "Anna!" she groaned, frustrated. While Anna wasn't that heavy, she had a grip like a vise. And Anna's feet were still all tangled up in Elsa's gown! "Anna, wake _up_!" This had no effect. Elsa took a breath, trying to shout and whisper at the same time. "_Anna!_"

Finally, Anna showed signs of life, in the form of an enormous yawn that treated Elsa to an unwitting and very detailed view of the inside of Anna's mouth. "Morning, Elsa!" Totally delighted to see her sister next to her, Anna hugged Elsa twice as hard, completely knocking the wind out of her.

Despite the breathing issue, it really was difficult for Elsa to complain too much. She could hardly blame Anna for being happy to see her. She'd missed Anna too. To say nothing of how _nice_ it felt to be all pressed up to Anna's body like this. Just the warmth of her was heavenly on its own. On the other hand, maybe enough was enough. Much more was gonna crack a couple of ribs. "Anna, a little gentler, please?" Not letting her smile drop, she nonetheless kept her tone gently stern.

"Oh! Sorry!" Anna immediately loosened her hold, though she didn't let go entirely. Snuggling with Elsa felt way too good to give up that easily. She spent a moment just staring at her sister. The day before had been such a blizzard of events and feelings and giddiness that she'd barely had a moment to actually look at the gorgeous woman Elsa had grown into. "Wow..." It was like seeing Hans that first time all over again, but a thousand times moreso. Elsa was _beautiful_.

Elsa couldn't help but giggle. After all these years, Anna was still a goof! "I missed you too, Anna. Come on, let's get breakfast." Her stomach could definitely use some food. Judging by the sun, they'd been in bed for so long that their first meal of the day was going to qualify as lunch rather than breakfast if they didn't get up soon.

Food sounded good to Anna, but even this temptation wasn't quite enough to make her want to let Elsa go just yet. Besides, there were a lot of other things on her mind besides food. "Elsa, there's still a lot I don't understand. Please?" The plea carried with it considerably more fear and pain than she'd intended, going completely against the mood. Right now she had Elsa in her arms. That really was enough for her. It was just all those questions that wouldn't stop nagging her. If she couldn't ask now, like this, she'd never be able to at all.

"Of course." Elsa smiled at her sister. Maybe Anna wasn't being so goofy after all. If she needed reassurance so badly that she was willing to put off breakfast to get it, Elsa was more than happy to give it to her. "Ask me anything."

Anna took a deep breath. She was still staring at Elsa, still holding her very close. "Why did you close the door?" She stopped, then before Elsa could even begin to form a reply, added, "I know, you didn't want to hurt me, but why didn't you tell me? I didn't even know you had magic, I thought you didn't like me anymore! Why did you hide? Elsa, I needed you..." And just like that she was crying, tears falling into Elsa's hair and onto her face, sparkling in the sunlight like miniature flames.

Elsa wanted not to answer. She wanted to lie. Anything but the truth. But the truth was what Anna deserved. After everything that had happened, all her dear Anna wanted was to know why it had taken a heartless prince and an eternal winter to get Elsa out from behind that door. "Anna, I... I..." There was a catch in her throat. "Mother and Father told me I wasn't to ever tell you, or anyone. They said you'd get hurt if I did, and then they-" Again she had to stop, try to collect herself. "I thought if I let you in, you'd get hurt, like what happened on the mountain... I wanted to open the door, Anna, I promise I did! I needed you too, I swear!" She knew her tears were turning to snowflakes, to ice, on her face, but for once she didn't care.

"Elsa, no, don't cry! It's okay now, we're together again!" And how. Even in their youth Anna couldn't remember ever feeling this close to Elsa. Her heart felt like bursting with joy again. Elsa really did love her. Nothing else mattered.


	3. Song

Elsa wasn't sure how long she'd been in Anna's arms, or how long Anna had been in hers. It was all a blur of feeling. Her eyes were pretty blurred too, now that she thought about it. She blinked a few times, but couldn't see anything more than light and a smear of auburn red across her vision. Anna's hair. She squinted hard, and heard the tiny tinkle of cracking ice crystals. A tiny giggle escaped her; she'd cried so much in her happiness that her eyes had completely iced over. She opened her eyes again, but there was still too much ice to see through; the smear of color was now a frozen fractal. She wanted to rub her eyes, but her arms were busy being wrapped around her sister. "Anna?"

A few seconds went by with no answer. A whisper of fear threaded through Elsa's mind, but the warmth of Anna's body gave the lie to any such worry instantly. And the queen felt downright silly when, only a moment later, Anna's voice came to her ears. "What?" She sounded like she'd almost fallen asleep again.

"Don't you think we should get out of bed eventually? It's hours after dawn." Most of Elsa actually would have been happy staying there with Anna all day, but her stomach was raising increasingly strenuous objections. And the idea of a bath also sounded pretty nice. Maybe even a warm bath, now that she could control her powers!

"Oh Elsa, don't you like it here with me?" Anna's tone was earnest, but the hint of tease in it was quite clear. She was pretty hungry too. Of course, there was no way she was letting Elsa get away without at least a giggle.

"Of course I do, Anna. You like it here too, right?" Elsa didn't need to be able to see to give Anna a very sweet smile.

Anna blinked. Was Elsa teasing her in return? Well, in that case Anna wasn't gonna hold back! "I _love_ it here!" Okay, that was just the truth. "You know, people might talk if they saw us like this."

Elsa almost blushed, but no way was she going to let Anna get away with it that easily! "Are you afraid Kristoff might be jealous?"

"Well he's great and all but you're a lot n-" Anna shut her mouth abruptly. That sentence was going somewhere _way_ too weird. "Um, maybe you're jealous of him!" There, that was better. Anna felt a rather belated relief. That's what she got for speaking without thinking.

Elsa made a bit of a face. What _had_ Anna been about to say? Maybe she was just getting carried away with the teasing. It'd been a long time since she'd had a chance to really laugh with her sister, and Elsa wasn't sure if she still knew everything about Anna anymore. Either way, the mood was broken. "I really missed you, Anna." She shook her head, smiling again. "But can you help me get the ice out of my eyes now?"

"Huh? Ice?" Anna actually looked at Elsa instead of just being aware of her. Sure enough, there were little shattered ice crystals covering Elsa's eyes. Little frost trails were running down her face. "Wow, your tears froze."

Elsa pursed her lips, taking a patient tone. "Yes, Anna, my tears froze."

Fascinated, Anna leaned in to stare closer at the bits of ice. "That's so cool!" Giggling at her own little pun, she didn't realize she was getting too close until she bumped noses with her sister. "Oof! Sorry!"

_Oh, Anna._ Elsa restrained herself from saying it aloud, just barely. "It's okay, Anna."

"Wow, though. I can't believe you never told me about this power!" She started trying to unwind her arms from around Elsa so she could actually use her hands. She'd sure gotten all tangled up during the night. Or was it after they'd woken up? Maybe both. She carefully brushed the bits of ice and snow off of Elsa's face, revealing her sister's brilliant blue eyes in perfect detail.

_You'd always known, Anna. Then you almost died. I had no idea that hiding it was going to make things so much worse. I thought I was protecting you._ A second time, she restrained herself. She'd said most of it already. And as much as she wished Anna could remember the fun parts, she didn't want to bring back the memory of a frozen head with them. She wished she could somehow erase the memory of the frozen heart too. In the light of day, awake, it was a little harder to get lost in Anna as she had in the night without remembering her own heart breaking to see her sister turned to ice. She couldn't quite shake the fear that it would happen again yet, no matter how much love she had in her. She kept her silence while Anna brushed the ice away, her eyes at last clearing so she could see Anna's happy smile. Then again, maybe the fear was silly after all. "You know now." She took Anna's hands in her own, sitting up. "No more hiding. And no more princes you just met, okay?"

Anna blushed hotly as she shot upright. Wearing a plain undershirt, rather than the more elegant nightgown Elsa had chosen, the sudden motion left her wishing she had somewhat more on. Not that she really _cared_ what Elsa might see. "Hey, you didn't know he was all mean either, you were just afraid 'cause I was babbling on about all the people coming here!"

There was no denying that. The very idea of Anna falling in love at the drop of a hat like that had completely thrown Elsa; she'd never paused to actually think about Hans himself at all. And if she hadn't been so horrified by what he'd said about what her ice had done- Elsa had to admit to herself that she'd harbored thoughts of teaching Hans a lesson more harsh than a fist to the face. But then Anna's own forthright and straightforward response had been so _funny_ that she'd almost immediately forgotten. She smiled at Anna again. She was doing a lot of smiling today. It was nice to have things to smile about again. "You're right, I was." Elsa stood up from the bed at last, letting Anna's hands fall away.

Still sitting, Anna just watched as Elsa went to the window. How could someone just getting out of bed be so _elegant_!? She couldn't even be jealous of her sister, too busy admiring. _Wait, is that nightgown transpa- YIKES_! Anna quickly looked somewhere else. It wasn't quite that bad, but better safe than sorry. She had no idea at all whether Elsa would be embarrassed to be seen that way by her sister, but Anna didn't particularly want to see it anyway!

Elsa was completely unaware of Anna's awkward moment. She looked out through the heavily frosted window, letting the sunlight it let through warm her. "Anna, do you remember the ice song Father taught us?"

"Of course I do!" Without hesitation, Anna burst into slightly off-key melody. "_Born of cold and winter air, and mountain rain combining,_" she all but belted out, in the style of the ice miners, but stopped when she realized Elsa had joined in.

Elsa's voice was clear and strong, singing the deep-voiced melody in a flawless key, at least a full octave higher than Anna's. "_This icy force both foul and fair has a frozen heart worth mining._"

With her sister's voice singing with her, Anna found herself easily drifting back into the right key. Together they went on, "_So cut through the heart, cold and clear, strike for love and strike for fear, see the beauty sharp and clear. Split the ice apart, and break the frozen heart!_" Anna laughed in absolute delight.

Not trying to to sing through her sister's laughter, Elsa turned back to Anna and smiled, radiant. "'_Ice has a magic, can't be controlled,_'" she quoted. "But it can." She spread her hand upright before her, and shimmering blue light became sparkling snowflakes drifting from the ceiling, a momentary flurry covering the whole room.

As cold as the snow was, Anna's heart felt so warm she thought she might melt.


	4. Beauty

"Elsa?"

"Yes, Anna?"

"Weren't we gonna have breakfast?"

"It would be lunch now, Anna."

"I guess that means moving, huh?"

Elsa gently tapped her sister's nose. "Yes, Anna."

"Why do you keep saying my name like that, anyway?"

Elsa's voice turned a bit softer, sadder. "It's been a long time since I could think of you and not be sad, Anna." Then a smile. "I'm enjoying it."

Anna blushed a bit, shifting as if to pull away from Elsa but not quite risking it just yet. She still wasn't very steady on ice, and even the momentary snow shower had made the floor _very_ slippery. It was almost as if Elsa had planned it that way to get more snuggling out of her, but Anna was almost sure Elsa wasn't that devious. Almost. "The sky's awake, Elsa! The gates are open, everyone's waiting to see the beautiful queen, and I just _know_ Olaf's getting into trouble somewhere out there!" She giggled.

_Oh, Anna... You say it as if I was the one who closed those doors._ Elsa was beginning to feel like two different people in one, yanked back and forth between a strange kind of ecstasy and countless memories of sadness that she could barely tell how she truly felt. Anna, irrepressible energetic restless Anna, was the only constant. Did she realize how her words affected Elsa? Anna had been no less lonely on the other side of that door, Elsa knew that, but she wondered if Anna really understood how powerless she had felt. "Anna, I want to stay here with you. The rest of the world can wait." She tried another smile. "I'm sure Olaf will be alright."

Her sister's answer took Anna completely by surprise. _Stay here? With me?_ "But there's so much out there you've missed! Last night, when we skated, and the fjord, and we were having so much fun! How could you want to stay hidden away in here again?" Despite herself, a little fear crept into her tone. She'd rather turn to ice again than find Elsa behind another closed door. "Stay here with me, what does that even mean? We're sitting around in pajamas, there's so much we could be doing!"

Elsa couldn't help but smile wryly. What she was wearing was barely more than nothing, and Anna's 'pajamas' were going to fall off her if she moved around much more. But that was incidental. What mattered was Anna's fear, probably more audible than she thought it was. And Elsa knew no way to explain without the whole truth. "What happened yesterday wasn't the first time you got hurt because of me, Anna. I know you don't remember." She really hadn't wanted to bring this up, but Anna deserved to understand. "When we were very little, you knew all about my power. What you remember as games in the snow were me using my magic." She took a deep breath. "One night you were so excited, running around so fast, I tried to catch you as you were falling, and I missed, and..." Her voice broke. "It froze your head, on the inside..." It took her a moment to go on, and she was faintly relieved that Anna didn't try to interrupt. "Mother and Father came and took us to the rock trolls. Their elder took the ice out and erased your memory, and that was when they closed the gates and told me I had to hide away so it wouldn't happen again."

Anna was absolutely speechless. It explained so much! Why everything had suddenly changed, why Elsa was so afraid, why she'd turned Anna away up on the mountain, even why those "love experts" of Kristoff's had seemed faintly familiar somehow. The implications raced through Anna's mind at the speed of light. For Elsa to have found that Anna's companionship had been the answer all along, after all that- "E-Elsa? Do you think you'll lose control again if I'm not right here?"

Nodding slowly, Elsa hugged her sister harder, practically clinging. "When I'm afraid, I lose control. But with you here, it's like this whole missing piece of myself I didn't even know was gone is back. I missed you so much I couldn't bear it, Anna, and I thought I had to stay away, even when you came after me." Even with Anna right here in her arms, a stab of pain went through Elsa at the memory of her sister's pleading face. The whole time, all she'd wanted was to be with Anna again. "You came anyway, and all that fear was for nothing. It happened again, and worse, and it didn't matter because you were with me again." She laughed a little. "Everything I was afraid of didn't matter because you were there."

"Well then, I'm never going away ever!" Anna declared, rather proudly. "I am your Majesty's faithful love puppet!" She slowly crossed her eyes, not letting her haughty expression shift one bit.

Elsa burst out giggling in thoroughly undignified fashion. Only Anna could look so absolutely ridiculous. "Really?" she asked, her tone teasing again. "I thought that Kristoff boy would get at least of your attention. Didn't I see you kissing him just before we went skating?" Though, come to think of it, she wasn't sure she liked that image so much. If she didn't know better, she'd think she was jealous. _Over Anna?_ Even that thought was worth a giggle of its own.

"Hey! That was just to be nice, he helped me out a lot! He's more like kind've a brother, I guess. It's like I kissed you!" Anna blinked, doing a double-take. That hadn't come out quite how she'd meant. "I-I mean, you know, like on the cheek or something!" Darn it, now she was blushing all over again. What a crazy mental image! It was a relief when Elsa just shook her head as she always did at Anna's nonsense, but Anna's blood almost froze in her veins all over again at her sister's next words.

"Why Anna, do you want to kiss me?" It was impossible for Elsa to take this seriously. Maybe it was just a little bit mean to get so much enjoyment out of teasing her, but she couldn't quite help herself. Anna looked so _flustered_!

Anna couldn't quite figure out if Elsa was kidding or just crazy. In the end she just stared blankly, clueless.

As much fun as keeping a straight face was, it was starting to get weird with Anna staring like that. "I'm teasing, Anna." _I really hope she already knew that._ Anna could be be awfully slow on the uptake at times. "Lunch actually does sound pretty good."

Relieved to be free of the weirdness, Anna poked Elsa's arm. "Oh no you don't! Now you're stuck with me!"

"Is that right?" A mound of snow abruptly sprouted under Anna's feet, lifting her right off the floor with a gasp and into the air. A moment passed before Anna slid right back down the snowbank and landed neatly back in Elsa's arms. "As Queen of Arendelle, I decree that I shall be as stuck with you as it pleases me to be."

Anna made a mock curtsey. "Yes, your Majesty! And how stuck with me does it please you to be?"

"You will join me for lunch. That is not a request." She paused a moment. "But let's get dressed first." A slight blush colored her cheeks.

"Wha-?" Looking at herself, Anna saw that her momentary adventure with the snow and the over exaggerated curtsey had completely unseated her undershirt, leaving most of her chest exposed. Oops. "Aaah!" She clapped her arms around her chest. "Elsa! Why would you not _tell_ me!?"

"Sorry."

"That's what you said when you told that Weaseltown guy I wanted to dance!" Anna ran to hide behind the bed.

"Weselton, Anna."


	5. Art

"Elsa, I don't get it."

Elsa knew full well what Anna wanted to know, but saying so would have given away the answer. "Don't get what, Anna?"

The redhead gave an exasperated sigh. "How we keep ending up like this again. Every time we move, a minute later, well-!" She gestured at the two of them as best she could, given Elsa's arms around her. "I wouldn't let you go last night and now you're the one who keeps holding on to me!" She wasn't quite sure what she was getting worked up about. Snuggling with Elsa was really nice! It was just that it was all she'd been doing.

A smile touched Elsa's lips again. "You keep slipping on the ice, Anna." It was hardly _her_ fault if the ice kept shaping itself so that Anna would fall right back on her, after all. It wasn't as if she had power over ice, or anything.

Her sister wasn't buying a bit of it. "You keep making more!" She poked Elsa's shoulder. "You have so much power I can't even believe all the things I saw you do! You made a whole palace out of ice, you froze _and_ thawed the whole fjord, you even made Olaf come alive! When you're not scared the ice does exactly what you want, so don't you even pretend you're not making it do this too!"

"If I'd only known that at any moment I could have opened the door and let you in... Anna, I feel like if I let you out of my sight again, it'll all go back the way it was! It doesn't make sense, I know that." Elsa buried her face in Anna's fiery hair, her tears melting as quickly as they froze.

Anna just stood there, letting Elsa cry. She sounded as shattered as when she'd been sobbing over Anna's frozen body, right up until she'd noticed it thawing. It was the first thing Anna had heard as the ice melted. The first thing she'd felt was Elsa's arms around her, just like they were now. She couldn't believe her eyes. Just the _idea_ of losing her was as bad for Elsa as thinking it was actually happening?

Then it hit her. _I'm all she ever had._ Everyone else had told Elsa to be afraid. Anna was the only one who never stopped believing in her. How had she not seen it before? "Elsa..." Anna wrapped her arms as tight around her sister as they'd go and held on for dear life. "Elsa, I'm here. I'm not going anywhere, I promise! Please, it's okay now." Elsa barely seemed to hear her, but Anna couldn't blame her for that. It felt like she was letting out years of loneliness all at once. Anna nuzzled weakly at Elsa's cheek. "It's really okay!"

Hearing Anna's reassurances only made Elsa cry harder for all the time she'd spent shutting Anna out. She couldn't stop. Her tears were making a dampened mess of Anna's hair. Her knees finally gave out, and she fell onto the ice she'd summoned, dragging Anna down with her. She landed on her bottom, staring up surprised into Anna's equally astonished eyes, barely an inch away.


	6. Time

Anna felt like time was frozen. Every last detail of Elsa's face filled her vision. The tiny sparkles of frost dotting the corners of her eyes, where tears were still forming. The intense icy blue of her irises. The sweep of her eyebrows, the roundness of her cheeks, the strands of blonde hair falling over her forehead, her perky nose. The fullness of her magenta lips, parted slightly with surprise. Anna couldn't breathe. Elsa's lips were millimeters from her own. She could see herself reflected in Elsa's pupils, the pure black seeming to pull her in. She thought she might drown. As if in a dream, she watched - or let, she wasn't sure - gravity pull her down that last fraction of an inch. Their lips met.

Fire blossomed from Anna's mouth, spreading through every fiber of her being. There was no room left in her brain for thought, just one word- _Elsa._ For just an instant, she remained still. Then instinct took her. She folded her arms around Elsa and pulled her sister up tight against herself. There was no thought, no questions. Just Elsa. She _needed_ her Elsa.

Elsa had no chance to protest. Tears would have given way to wonder at Anna's longing expression, but there wasn't time for even that. When Anna's lips met hers, all she could do was _feel_ it. Anna's passion came through with more impact than any merely physical sensation. She was instantly lost in it. A tiny corner of her mind wondered what was happening - was Anna _kissing_ her?! - but she didn't, couldn't care. Her whole body was tingling. Without quite realizing it, she pressed herself up to Anna. All her fear and pain melted away in the first second. Anna was _here_, and was never, ever going away.

The moment stretched on into eternity, until finally, Elsa pushed her sister away. It was barely even a push, more of a light nudge, but it was enough to break the contact. Elsa was left gasping for breath, as if she hadn't taken in oxygen for a minute at least. Maybe she hadn't, she wasn't sure. Never in her life had she felt anything like _that_! Her mind just couldn't process it. "A-Anna?" Her voice was a breathless squeak. Even if it wasn't, she had no idea what to say.

Anna didn't answer. She looked so surprised that at any other moment, Elsa would have giggled at the expression. "Anna?" Still no answer. "Anna!"

All at once, Anna let go. The movement caused her to roll off Elsa and onto her side, then her back. Her voice was so soft Elsa could barely hear her, even from less than a foot away. "I'm sorry..."

Elsa slowly sat up, trying to figure out if she was dreaming. It seemed no less likely than Anna actually- She couldn't even finish the thought. It felt too strange. Besides, the way Anna had fallen, it could easily have been an accident. Yes, that made sense. Anna wasn't exactly the most graceful princess who ever lived. "It was an accident."

Anna wasn't so sure about that. Sure, it was an accident that she'd fallen. Was it an accident that she'd fallen that last tiny bit of the way? She couldn't tell. Everything was a mix of confusion and embarrassment and that feeling of having Elsa all pressed up to her. She couldn't put a name to it. It was a lot like snuggling her in bed had been, but stronger. And her lips were so soft and full. Kissing Kristoff hadn't come close... Anna shook her head hard. What was she _thinking_ about? "I don't know what it was! One second you were crying, and the next we fell, and then you were right there, and-" Realizing her voice was rising, she stopped.

"Anna, calm down. Accidents happen." Elsa was determined to keep thinking of it that way. The alternative was too weird to even consider. Of course, Anna had other ideas. Elsa might have guessed that her sister's stubborn streak would kick in.

"Why should it have to be an accident? Maybe I did it on purpose, so there! And why shouldn't I anyway? You're supposed to k-kiss people you love and I love you!" Words were falling out of Anna's mouth faster than she could think them.

Deja vu. Hadn't she just yesterday been trying to tell Anna that she had no idea what love meant? Elsa could have laughed. If that misadventure on the mountain had proven anything, it was that she didn't know any more about love than Anna did. Maybe less. "That's a different kind of love, Anna. I'm your sister."

"Well obviously! So what? It's not different at all! Are you talking about _romance_? Ugh, no! And I take it back, I'm not sorry one bit! I didn't mean to, you were just right there and I wasn't even thinking about it! It can't be that bad! What's wrong with it anyway?" Anna had no idea what she was trying to say at all, except that she did want to know the answer to that question.

"It's-" Elsa paused. "Well, it's- it's just not done. I don't know why." Anna was right, it hadn't been so bad. She was sure there was some reason it was wrong, but right this moment she couldn't quite put her finger on it. It didn't matter. Elsa could see Anna was more frightened than anything else. She reached over and pulled Anna into her lap, hugging her sister as tight as she could. "It's alright, Anna."

Anna immediately snuggled into Elsa's arms, laying her head on Elsa's shoulder. "Elsa, I don't care about any weird stuff, I just don't want you to go away again. It was so lonely without you!"

"I'll never leave you alone again, Anna. I promise." _Oh Anna, don't you understand how lost I'd be without you?_ She'd felt a moment of freedom up on that mountain, yes, but only until she remembered the look on Anna's face as she'd run away. Everything that had happened since only proved that she needed Anna just as much as Anna needed her. _Enough to let her kiss you?_ a small part of her mind asked, but she pushed the thought away. The answer was yes, but Anna was right. It didn't matter.


	7. Life

Anna sighed softly, resting against her sister, noticing again how Elsa possessed a natural coolness to her skin that drew away extra heat without being uncomfortably chilling. It was like laying on a snowbank that never melted, with the sun shining down from above. She idly wondered whether Elsa was doing that on purpose. Who knew _what_ Elsa could do? It was obvious that she didn't understand it herself. Anna wanted to help her explore it. But she resented it too. That was the power that'd kept Elsa away from her for the greater part of their lives, not to mention nearly killed her- twice. Again the memory of Elsa's broken sobbing over her frozen body came back to her. Anna frowned. No way she was gonna let Elsa be scared of something like that anymore! She was just gonna have to make sure they learned about it together, like it should have been all along.

Then her stomach started rumbling. She winced. Just how long _had_ they been snuggling and playing on the ice and chasing each other around the room and ki- falling down, anyway? "Elsa, this is really comfortable and all, but I'm really hungry!"

Elsa just smiled at her. Anna could swear she saw more than a little mischief in that smile. She _knew_ that look. That look meant Anna was about to be surprised by something wonderful her sister had in mind. As a child, Elsa had always been deviously playful. Even as young as she'd been before the door had closed between them, Anna remembered a hundred little moments of joy inspired by Elsa's childish schemes. She wondered eagerly what Elsa could concoct now, all grown up and with so much power at her fingertips. She couldn't keep excitement out of her voice. "Elsa, what is it?"

"I think the princess of Arendelle should make up her own mind about when she takes her lunch, Anna. Don't you?" Elsa answered, in her most regal tone. Even the smile was gone, replaced with a very stern expression.

Disappointment coursed through Anna. What was that supposed to mean? It sounded almost scolding. Was Elsa trying to punish her for that _accident_ with the kissing? Then she got it. She laughed aloud, hugging Elsa so hard that her sister groaned a little. How did Elsa know her so _well_ after all this time? "I sure do!" She hopped to her feet, grateful she wasn't wearing a dress or gown to trip over. She barely noticed the ice melting away under her feet as she dashed for the clean set of clothes she'd left on a chair in the corner. It was a near-copy of the dress she'd worn to Elsa's coronation, save that the green was a much lighter shade. Paying no attention to anything else in her excitement, she was fully clothed in twenty seconds flat. Only then did she turn around and see Elsa giving her a very wry look. "What?"

Elsa shook her head. "Anna, if you're so embarrassed by kissing me, you should be at least a little ashamed to change your clothes with me watching." She sounded very amused, as if neither incident was anything more than something to tease her sister with.

Oh. Anna was so excited that it had never even occurred to her that she must have shown off pretty much everything there was to show in the process of changing so quickly. She felt a blush creeping up on her, but pushed it back by sheer force of will. No _way_ was she giving Elsa the satisfaction! She adopted a haughty tone, but as it had with Kristoff, it came out sounding somewhat silly. "I will change before whomever I choose!" No, that didn't sound like what she wanted to say at all. She tried again. "I mean, I can be naked whenever I want!" Oops. It was all the worse because she knew Elsa had expected her to react this way. "Elsa, you know what I mean! Stop teasing me, or I'll- I'll-" She trailed off, unable to think of something to threaten.

Her sister raised one elegant eyebrow at her. How could someone sitting on the _floor_, in that translucent nightgown, still look so queenly? "Yes?"

Fuming, Anna said the first thing that popped into her head. "I'll kiss you again!"

Now she couldn't hold back the blush at all. And her fuming rose to new heights when Elsa said only, "Go ahead," in a perfectly calm, almost patient tone. The same Elsa who five minutes ago had been talking about how certain things simply weren't done!

Anna couldn't figure out if Elsa was still teasing or was actually daring her to do it. The Elsa that Anna knew could never hide her laughter when playing, but right now she wasn't laughing. Just smiling. "Well, fine then!" Before she could think better of it, she walked right back over to Elsa, knelt down, and kissed her.

Unlike the first time, it lasted only a moment before Anna pulled away. Blushing brighter than ever, she stared at Elsa, speechless now that she'd carried through on her threat. She hadn't thought Elsa would let her do it at all, much less invite her. She could have breathed fire when all Elsa did was calmly stand up, still smiling, and ask, "Shall we eat now?" It was like she hadn't even noticed. How could she possibly be so calm about something so _intense_?

But Anna's frustration was sidetracked when she saw ice gather itself around Elsa in a swirl of blue and form into that dress she'd been wearing in the ice palace. _She can make clothes too?_ Ire instantly forgotten, Anna all but pounced her, laughing and hugging her tight. "You're gonna show me _everything_ you can do!" She blinked. "After lunch." She grabbed Elsa's hand and dragged her sister, still with that amused smile, towards the door.


	8. Magic

Magic

"Anna, slow down, you're going to make yourself sick." Elsa winced just watching Anna eat. "I'm not going anywhere." The questioning looks on everyone's faces when she and Anna had finally emerged from her room had been embarrassing enough. Then again, how did she know Anna didn't always eat this way? She tried to remember the last time she'd sat at a table with her sister, but it had been so long that nothing came to her. A stab of loneliness went through her, and she started to reach across the table towards Anna before she realized what she was doing.

Anna, of course, gave Elsa a weak smile for all of three seconds before going right back her speed-eating. Elsa wasn't surprised. Her sister was a force of nature. There was no getting in her way once her mind was set on something. She'd caught a few details of what Anna'd gone through to follow her up the mountain, mostly from Olaf. She still couldn't believe it all.

Elsa picked at her own meal somewhat moodily. While she hadn't eaten since before the coronation, and she _was_ hungry, the food just didn't appeal to her. There were too many feelings in her head. She didn't want food. She wanted to go back to ten minutes before, caught in the whirlwind of Anna's scatterbrained antics. As selfish as it felt, she wanted to be the center of Anna's attention again. She couldn't even be afraid of hurting Anna anymore; what could she possibly do that love hadn't already solved? She remembered all too clearly that as children they'd rarely been apart for more than minutes at a time. She tried to imagine what it would have been like if only she hadn't been shut away from Anna. A tear leaked from the corner of her eye at the thought, leaving a trail of frost down her cheek.

She was abruptly jolted from her thoughts by the realization that Anna was peering at her her from inches away. "Elsa? Hellooooo, is anyone in there?"

The queen gave a start, her chair making a dull thud against the floor with the sudden motion. "Anna!" How long had Anna been trying to get her attention? "What is it?" Had Anna seen how sad she'd felt?

"You're not eating anything!" Anna grabbed Elsa's fork, speared a vegetable, and held it practically to Elsa's lips. "You need it worse than I do!" From what Elsa could tell, Anna intended to actually sit there and feed her if need be.

The sight made her want to laugh aloud. Anna often picked odd ways to show her love and devotion, but there was never any doubt about the feelings being there. The very image of Anna before her, ready with fork, was wonderfully absurd. Elsa opened her mouth and took the bite of food presented to her.

Anna crossed her arms. "Now keep going!" Elsa could tell her sister was trying to look stern, but the effect was ruined by the worry in it. She supposed Anna had a point. Starving herself, even just because she was distracted, wasn't a great way to start on having a normal life back.

She gave Anna what she hoped was a reassuring smile and took the fork. "As you command, my princess." She took another bite, musing. Anna somehow kept bringing out a sense of humor Elsa didn't know she had. A thought occurred to her, and she looked up at a still-giggling Anna. "Anna, when all is said and done, I'm very glad that you met Hans."

She was momentarily torn between wanting to giggle at and feeling bad for the look of outright horror that crossed Anna's face. Naturally, Anna gave her no opportunity to expand on the thought. "You're _what!?_ After all that and what he tried to do and-!" Anna stopped there, choked by her incredulity.

"If not for his proposal to you, you wouldn't have argued with me at the dance. You wouldn't have pulled off my glove, I wouldn't have lost control and run, and I might easily have hid in my room the rest of my life. Anna, of course I don't approve of anything he did, but he did get you to confront me." Elsa reached over to take Anna's hand, holding it to her cheek. "I was planning to leave the gates open, for your sake. You would have been able to leave whenever you liked. I wouldn't have gone after you, I was too afraid." Another tear was falling down her cheek, but this one made no trail of frost; Anna's hand was too warm.

Elsa could only imagine what her sister might say. That she would've found something else to confront Elsa about, that Hans hadn't made a difference at all, that she never would have left even if the gates were open, that it wasn't the gates that kept her inside in the first place... Elsa could believe any of those. She didn't expect what Anna did say. "You're right, Elsa." Her heart nearly broke at the hurt in Anna's voice. "You wouldn't have come out for me, and I wouldn't have gone in after you."

Until that moment, Elsa hadn't realized just how alone Anna had felt. She had no idea why Elsa had withdrawn. She must have thought Elsa _wanted_ to close her away. She'd begged for Elsa to open the door, that night their parents' ship sank, and Elsa - who still remembered what her father had warned her would happen if she let Anna in - had cried alone in her room. There was no way Anna could have known that turning away that plea had hurt Elsa almost as badly as their shared loss. And at the dance, Elsa had been so panicked she hadn't seen how angry and frustrated Anna was. Of course Anna hadn't come in after her. And she'd _still_ kept pushing Anna away.

She stared at Anna, at a loss for words.


	9. Light

Anna really wished Elsa would say something. She hadn't meant to speak her thoughts so harshly. She stared back into Elsa's eyes, unable to look away. She wondered if Elsa could feel her heartbeat through her hand, still pressed to Elsa's cheek. The chill of Elsa's tears stung almost as harshly as the fact of their existence.

She opened to her mouth to retract her words, but she couldn't. _No!_ she thought. _I meant it! She didn't come out! She left me all alone!_ Even knowing _why_ Elsa had hidden away wasn't enough to silence her frustration any longer. Elsa should have _known_ she needed her sister, whatever the risk. If the last day and night had proven anything, it was that Elsa needed her just as badly! Why hadn't it been enough?

So deep was Anna in her thoughts that she almost missed it when Elsa finally did say something. "Anna, I didn't realize..." A cold shiver ran through Anna at her sister's voice. Even up on the mountain, hearing she was responsible for an eternal winter, Elsa hadn't sounded so miserable. "Father said you would get hurt. He said you'd die if I didn't hide it all away. And he was almost right! You turned to ice, because I was too afraid!"

"No, because you didn't believe in me!" Anna didn't want to argue. She wanted more than anything to go back to just a little while ago, when they'd been all but lost in each other. But there was a fire inside her that wouldn't calm. "You could have come down the mountain with me! If I'd cared what might happen to me, I wouldn't have gone after you, don't you see that? Maybe Father didn't understand how much I needed you, but I know you do!" Now she was crying again too. She'd felt Elsa's need for her in every moment Elsa's arms were around her. Wasn't it reasonable to think Elsa knew it went both ways?

Elsa tried to look away, but Anna's hand - the one Elsa herself was holding in place - kept her from turning her head. "Anna." That shiver went through Anna again. "I did believe in you. I knew you weren't going to give up. I didn't believe in myself, and I thought-" Elsa's hesitation made Anna's breath catch in her throat. "I thought you'd have someone else to take care of you."

"But at the dance, you said-"

"Because I didn't want you to get hurt by someone else either! But then you pulled off my glove, and I couldn't control any of it, and I was so afraid, I thought you'd be better off without me!"

"Elsa, no!" Anna wondered distantly if Elsa could see how angry she was. She wasn't sure if it was coming out in her words. "It wouldn't have mattered even if Hans was everything I thought he was. Nothing could make losing you okay. How can you even say that? I thought I was gonna die when I got in Hans' way out there on the ice!"

She regretted the words as soon as they were out of her mouth. Elsa looked so heartbroken, if she hadn't been sitting down already Anna was sure her sister would have fallen. Her anger overcome by guilt, she threw herself into Elsa's arms, clinging with all her might, crying into Elsa's bare shoulder. She could barely breathe through her tears, yet was acutely aware of how intensely warm her body was against Elsa's much cooler form. The difference was so extreme now that though it should have been the furthest thing from her mind, she couldn't help but notice. She was also more faintly conscious that half the room was icing up. When Elsa wrapped her arms around her in return, the chill sent a tremor through her, and Elsa's breath as she spoke was like the wind on the mountain.

"Anna, I was afraid if I came out to see you, they'd send you away. Hearing you through the door was better than nothing at all. Then, that night... Knowing what I do now, I realize that was the one time it really wouldn't have been safe for you to see me, but all I knew then was I was alone and afraid. And then you stopped coming to the door. I know better now, but then I thought I'd already lost you. I had no idea what to say to you after the coronation, I was so happy to see your face and I tried to show it but then you came back with Hans, and I- I thought you were trying to tell me you wanted to go. Anna, I'm so sorry!"

At a complete loss for words, Anna held to her sister for dear life, so awash with emotion that she felt like she would burn herself to ash with sheer feeling if not for Elsa's cooling touch. Everything, all her anger and frustration and loneliness, all because Elsa had tried to protect her. Elsa had been ready to do anything, even let her go, for that cause. What had it been like for her, hidden away in that room with only her fear and the memory of almost killing her sister for company? _I thought she didn't care about me anymore... and she thought seeing me would mean losing everything she had left!_

It was too overwhelming to contemplate. Her voice was choked, but her words were clear. "Elsa, I'm here and I'm never going away. You won't hurt me." Dimly, Anna realized the cold that had been filling the room had turned it into practically an ice cave, but she felt only the gentle coolness of Elsa's skin soothing her, easing what felt like a feverish heat. She wanted to lose herself in _that_ feeling, in Elsa, not all these memories and realizations. Now it made sense why Elsa kept refusing to let her go, even long past the point where it was just weird. It felt like she was never going to stop crying.

Until Elsa lifted her chin with the feather touch of two fingers, looked her in the eyes, and _smiled_. Anna felt like the wind had been knocked out of her. Her sister spoke, in the gentlest voice Anna had ever heard, even from Elsa. "I love you, Anna."

Anna thought her heart would burst out of her chest. "I love you too!" She laughed aloud, and couldn't stop, holding on to Elsa and knowing she never had to let go. She had her sister back at last.


	10. Fire

Elsa wasn't quite sure how long she'd spent holding Anna. Her sister's sweet laughter was a song she wished would never end. She couldn't get over how deep the warmth of Anna's body - or was it sheer feeling? - ran through her. She wondered distantly if being around Anna was always going to be this intense, or if over enough time they'd get used to being together again. Hopefully the latter; right now, the idea of even letting Anna out of her sight was too painful to consider, and she couldn't really spend every moment of the rest of her life like this. The very image of trying to sit on the throne and rule Arendelle with Anna forever in her lap was comical. _People could get the wrong idea!_ The thought made her giggle softly to herself.

Anna nuzzled at her sister's shoulder, sending little ripples of heat through the natural chill of Elsa's skin. "What's so funny?"

"I was considering how it might appear to the people of Arendelle if we were to be seen like this in public all the time." She raised an eyebrow at Anna, fully expecting her to react with comical disgust.

It seemed Anna had other plans. "Why, Elsa, I had no idea you thought of me that way!" She kept talking right over Elsa's astonished expression. "I _have_ noticed how pretty that dress is on you..." She looked up at Elsa with an expression of lust that could have been convincing, if she wasn't also crossing her eyes.

Elsa blushed a deep red. "Anna!" Even as obvious as it was that Anna was teasing, the very idea was still rather uncouth. But then, crossing one's eyes was an entirely improper way to attempt a joke. Perhaps Anna needed a better example of how to engage in humor. "Well, if that's how you feel about it, I think you should kiss me properly." She kept her voice as serious as she could manage, her expression completely serene.

Anna gave her a look that could only be described as terrified. Even then, Elsa stifled her giggles, determined not to let Anna off the hook. Then she tensed slightly as Anna leaned in closer. Was Anna so determined to have her joke that she'd actually do it? She was relieved when, halfway there, Anna collapsed in blushing giggles. "Elsa, no _way!_ You should see your face, did you really think I'd do that?"

Elsa wondered what her face was showing. Hopefully fear. It would be much preferable to her awkward curiosity, which could be too easily misread as genuine interest, though hopefully Anna would know better anyway. She didn't try to ask. "You did start it, Anna." She smiled at her sister. "Thank you for complimenting my dress."

Still, she was just a little disappointed too. The idea of exploring physical intimacy was entirely alien to the life she'd led before now. But she could have felt... safe, letting Anna be that close to her. There was certainly no one else she would ever trust so completely. And Anna was so pretty! Kissing her was wonderful as it was. Elsa couldn't help but wonder how much further Anna's impulsive, irrepressible energy could take her.

She was startled out of her thoughts by Anna's voice. She noticed Anna was still blushing quite deeply. Had her sister been thinking something similar? Or was she just embarrassed by how far Elsa had gotten her to take her attempt at teasing? Or had Elsa let more show on her face than she thought... "Are you gonna get rid of all this ice?"

Elsa looked around. The entire room could have been from the palace she'd created up in the mountains, there was so much ice everywhere. The only place there wasn't ice was right around them. It came right up to them from every direction, but stopped a meter away. It was as if Anna was a center of so much heat that the place she stood couldn't be frozen. Elsa shook her head, dismissing the thought, and reached out into the air with her palm upward. All the ice streamed to her at once in a brilliant show of deep blue light the color of her eyes and formed into a snowball, which she promptly tossed at Anna's nose. "Is that better?" she asked, in a rather sweet tone.

"Ack! Elsa!" Anna pawed at her face, brushing the snow away. Elsa started giggling again; she couldn't help it, Anna was just too cute. Her previous thoughts already forgotten, she started conjuring more snowballs to toss, though she made sure there were some that Anna could reach too. It wasn't very fair if only she had snow to throw, after all.


	11. Faith

Anna was having the time of her life. Throwing snowballs at Elsa in what was supposed to be a dining hall, laughing like they were children again, it was as if there'd never been a door between them at all. Everything that had gone wrong, it was just a bad dream, and this happiness was the truth of it.

She ducked a snowball headed for her face, hurled one back at Elsa in return, and promptly fell on her rear in the gathered snow, laughing. "I give up, you win!" Then she realized her snowball had struck Elsa dead center between the eyes and cracked up again. "Nevermind, I win!" Yes, this was the life she was meant to have. Not waiting alone in a castle she didn't dare leave for Elsa to come out from behind a door that never should have been closed. And definitely not seeking out some stupid prince for the sake of some crazy fantasy about romance. Elsa was right, she didn't know a thing about it.

_Hey, she doesn't either!_ It was obvious! How could Elsa possibly know a thing about romance? She hadn't ever even kissed a boy! In fact, Anna was pretty sure the only person Elsa had ever kissed was- _Oh yeah. Me._ She couldn't help starting to blush again. It was one thing to be impulsive in the moment. That's all it had been. Then, just now, Elsa had started sounding all serious about it. There had been that strange look on her sister's face. It hadn't looked like she thought it was a joke. It had looked like Elsa really _wanted_ to.

Anna didn't know what to think. Was Elsa curious, despite herself? _Okay, I_ understand _that!_ That made sense! Anna was kinda curious too. Being really close to Elsa did feel really good, in ways she had no names for. It was also really _weird_! Too weird. She wasn't too clear on what any of it was about. Some of the feelings were a little familiar. Every time Hans had grabbed her hand to keep her from falling, it had felt kinda like this. Kissing Kristoff had too, sort of.

She was so confused. The feelings in her body were the same, but Elsa was so _different_ from anyone else. Everything about Hans had been so sudden and intense, but if she was being really honest with herself, she hadn't really been surprised when he'd refused to kiss her. Horrified, scared, angry, but not surprised. It'd felt all wrong, from the moment she'd stumbled into the room and begged him for it, right up to the instant before he'd backed away. It had been like being in a fever delirium. None of it had felt real. Had she only liked him because he was really handsome and the first person to talk to her after Elsa ordered the gates opened? _And really charming and all that. Ugh!_ At least Kristoff had been honest about his feelings. When she'd kissed him, it felt like such a silly bit of happiness. She'd had to do _something_ to distract him (why?) from that totally ridiculous smug look on Sven's face.

And then Elsa had taken her onto the ice, and she'd instantly forgotten everything and everyone else. There was so much joy just being with Elsa and seeing her smile again, just like holding her all through the night, just like kissing her at dawn. Just like now. Not even Olaf's innocent cheer was any match for this.

But there was still something stirring inside her that _wasn't_ different. The more she was close to Elsa, the more she felt it. With Hans it had been a fleeting tingle in scattered moments. With Kristoff, it had been a little flutter here and there. With Elsa...! With Elsa it was a constant distraction, like the lights of a hundred fireflies flickering around her head. She wanted to snuggle Elsa and _never_ let go. And she wanted to know what kissing her again would be like. What did Elsa even mean by "properly"? Had she done it wrong somehow before? How would Elsa even know? Did she know?

Anna became belatedly aware that she'd just been staring blankly at nothing for a good fifteen seconds, blushing for no apparent reason, as all this raced through her head. Elsa was looking at her with a worried expression. "Anna? Are you alright?"

The worry on Elsa's face, in her voice, sent little sparks of wonder through Anna's head. She wanted to laugh at herself. Who cared about any of that weirdness? Elsa was there and cared about her. She threw herself back into a very surprised Elsa's arms, indulging her desire to laugh. "I'm fine, Elsa! I was just thinking about stuff." She laid her head back on Elsa's bare shoulder. _That dress is so open!_ "I'm so happy you're here."

Though still obviously confused, Elsa smiled at her. Anna couldn't help but marvel a little at how much such a small thing as a smile could make her feel so warm inside. "I'm happy I'm here too, Anna. I missed you." Then she added a question that made Anna's blood freeze. "What were you thinking about?"

"Oh! You know, just stuff." _Please please please don't make me say it!_

She should've known it wouldn't be that easy. Elsa gave her a patient, you're-not-kidding-anyone smile. "What kind of stuff?"

"Um... Hans, and Kristoff, and kissing, and you know, how it was kinda dumb."

Now Elsa's smile was just a bit playful. "Kristoff is dumb?"

"No! Kissing him was d-! I mean... no, he's not dumb... I don't think he is anyway? Kissing him was definitely dumb!" Anna was getting seriously flustered. She'd actually paused to remember how Sven seemed to be the one doing all the smart things, not Kristoff. Most of what Kristoff did was act goofy and pretend he heard Sven talking when he thought no one was listening. And then be all impulsive and bumbling when Sven wasn't around. _Just like me._ And besides, that wasn't even the point! Or was it? Anyway, kissing him had definitely been dumb.

"I see." Elsa paused. Anna could see thoughts going through Elsa's head, but she had no idea what they might be. "Was that all?"

How did she _know!_ "A-And you know, kissing you wasn't so dumb, and you looked like you liked thinking about it!" Now she'd done it. She couldn't even guess what Elsa would say to that. Anna was sure now that she'd misread the whole thing. Why would Elsa _ever_ take any of that seriously?

To her astonishment, Elsa shrugged. "I was curious what it would be like if you were serious about it, instead of falling on me or just being playful. I don't understand how I feel about things like this, Anna, but I do know I'd rather have you with me to figure it out than anyone else."

Anna almost felt like crying. Here she was getting all worked up and confused and trying to make sense of things by herself, and all the time Elsa was trying to tell her that they could figure it all out together. "Elsa..." She clung to Elsa with all her strength, shaking. She couldn't let go. "Elsa, I love you so much, please don't ever go away again!"

She couldn't see anymore, her eyes were so full of tears, but she felt Elsa's arms wrap tight around her. Elsa was shaking too. "I love you too, Anna. I'll never ever leave you, I promise, not ever."


	12. Hope

A long time had gone by, Elsa was fairly sure of that. Why that kept happening, she was less sure. Every time she ended up snuggling with Anna, minutes or even hours started melting away. It was so _easy_ to let the rest of the universe pass unnoticed. That she had been far too long without her sister, that she and Anna completed each other on so fundamental a level that being apart had done them terrible harm, she knew, or at least was finding out. But it kept getting mixed up with these other feelings, things she didn't understand at all. Trying to make sense of it kept leading right back into getting lost in just being with Anna again. And she could tell Anna was having the same problem.

In a way, she almost wished she could be up on that mountain again, right in those moments when she cast her glove and the tiara away. She'd felt so _free!_ In the thrill of truly letting her powers out for the first time, she'd forgotten for a short span even that she'd left Anna behind. And Anna had followed her anyway. Elsa had a fleeting vision of having remained up there, in a world where all was in her power and made sense. A world where the only one who could ever tell her what she should do or how she should feel was Anna.

She laughed to herself. It was a fantasy, of course. She might be immune to the freezing cold of the ice, but Anna wasn't. What had happened next in reality had proven that all too clearly. And without Anna, all she ever would have been was alone and afraid. _Don't let them in, don't let them see..._ But she wanted Anna to see.

She wanted _everyone_ to see! What she was capable of was never meant to be hidden away! There wasn't a one of all the people of Arendelle who'd spoken a word against her. All of that had been Hans and that awful Duke. It was as if all her kingdom together took their cue from Anna's own unwavering faith. And Anna had never doubted there was a reason for everything, Elsa knew; she'd only gotten so angry and hurt by not knowing what it was. And by being kept away.

Once again Elsa was struck by how everything that had ever gone wrong was could be traced back to being forced to shut Anna out. She hadn't wanted to. Being told she had no choice had been as terrible as that moment when the ice struck Anna. _And it wasn't_ even true_! If they would've just let me open the door for her, everything would have been okay!_ But she'd been too young to understand, and by the time she wasn't, she was too afraid to see anything but the fear.

Her thoughts were going in circles. Even that was Anna's doing. Only now, with Anna right here to calm her, did she dare let herself remember. She couldn't have borne a moment of it otherwise. Another soft giggle went through her. The idea of Anna as a force for calm! But it was true that being with Anna was the safest she'd ever felt.

Elsa opened her eyes - when had she shut them? - and just looked at Anna. Beautiful, redheaded, freckled, smiling Anna. She almost looked asleep, eyes closed and head nestled on Elsa's shoulder, breathing calm and even. Elsa reached up slowly to brush a few strands of that red hair out of Anna's face, and was belatedly amused to realize that yes, Anna had in fact dozed off in her arms. _Am I really just that comfortable, Anna?_

She couldn't blame her sister for being exhausted. The previous couple of days had been very eventful, and Anna had just finished having a snowball fight with her! Elsa could vouch for how tiring it could be to keep feeling so much intense emotion, too. If a little afternoon nap was Anna's solution to all the overload, it seemed to Elsa like a pretty good one.

Of course, sooner or later, Elsa was going to have to put some amount of effort and attention into actually being the Queen of Arendelle. As much as the image of sitting on the throne dealing with nobles and such while Anna drooled on her shoulder continued to amuse her, it probably wouldn't work very well. _I suppose if she was asleep, it would at least inspire less comment!_ But the question remained, was this intensity _ever_ going to lessen? Would they get used to each other finally?

_Do I even want to get used to her?_ As draining as this emotional back-and-forth was, as confusing as what seemed to come with it was being, there was the constant undercurrent of raw, unqualified happiness. She didn't want that feeling going anywhere!

Elsa shook her head. There wasn't anything that could ever make her stop being happy to be with Anna. _I need you too badly, Anna... Nothing's ever going to take me away from you again._


	13. Space

Anna awoke slowly, conscious of something cool and soft under her cheek. Her pillow. She couldn't have slept very long, if it was still so cold to the touch. She could tell she'd drooled in her sleep again, and made a mental note for the thousandth time to try and figure out just why that happened. What was she going to do today? Elsa's coronation was coming up, she remembered. Maybe she'd actually get to see Elsa as anything more than a shadow under the door, finally.

The thought felt strange, as if something about it didn't quite make sense, but she was clinging to hard to that dream she'd had to care. Elsa, out of her room. A snowball fight, a lot of crying, and something about kissing. _Yeah, right. Like Elsa would ever come out..._ But that didn't feel quite right either. Her brow knit together slightly. What was wrong with all these perfectly familiar thoughts? Was the coronation today? She became aware that her bed didn't feel right at all. Gravity told her she was tilted at an angle, and whatever she was lying on definitely wasn't flat. And instead of covers, she felt... arms?

"Elsa!" Memory came flooding back in a wild rush. Her eyes shot open to find Elsa looking at her from about two inches away, with a smile that had no right at _all_ to be so amused. That cool softness she'd drooled on was Elsa's shoulder. That didn't matter, though. What mattered was the dream was real. Elsa was really here! Everything she was afraid would vanish in an instant of waking was _real_. Without thinking about it, she wrapped her arms tight around Elsa and kissed her with reckless abandon.

Elsa, caught completely by surprise, just stared wide-eyed at her sister, but Anna didn't notice. She was utterly lost in the softness of Elsa's lips, the gentle pressure of body on body, the coolness of Elsa's skin, the smell of freshly fallen snow. Multitudes of sensation and feeling. There was a sweetness to it, building inside her. She couldn't stop. She didn't want to stop. Kissing Elsa that first time had been almost accident, so new that confusion overwhelmed the rest. The second time had been too short, and on a dare no less. But now there was nothing in the way of experiencing it _all_. She tried to push closer to Elsa, desperate for more.

The force of her motion was too much, and Elsa's chair toppled backwards. Anna landed atop her, their lips still locked together. She barely felt the impact. She couldn't breathe and didn't care. Her heart was pounding hard in her chest. And it still wasn't enough. She had no idea what she wanted from Elsa, but it was more than even this. She realized that Elsa was kissing her back now. Everything she was feeling tripled. She pressed herself strongly against her sister, all conscious thought buried under a need she couldn't name.

An instant later - or maybe an eternity, she couldn't tell which - the need for air became too much. Deeper, even more primal instinct forced her to pull away enough to gasp desperately for breath. The grip of desire broken, she rolled over onto her side, still trying to fill her lungs but not letting go of Elsa. She stared into Elsa's eyes, remembering that Elsa had said she was curious but still terrified of what she might say.

What Elsa _did_ say threatened to melt her brain. "Good morning to you too, Anna." And that smile. That perfect, quiet smile.

"That's _it?!_ That's all you have to say?! I dreamed that you were really here and I woke up and you really are and I can't help but kiss you and I don't understand anything about how that felt and all you have to say about it is good morning!? _It's not even morning!_"

She wanted to scream at Elsa's reply. "It was very nice." No, scream wasn't quite right. She wanted to kiss her again. Maybe more. She didn't know what more could possibly be, but whatever it was, she wanted it. She realized Elsa was still talking. "I don't think it matters if we understand, Anna." She felt Elsa's hand come to rest on her cheek, the cold of it easing instantly what felt like a raging fire inside her. "I think all that matters is being happy."

It hit Anna all at once that no matter how much she tried to tell herself that her sister was older, the crowned Queen of Arendelle, the one everyone looked to, it was Elsa who was looking to her. It was Elsa who'd been hidden away in a room with only the perfunctory knowledge of rule for company. It was Elsa who, in living with so much fear, knew far less about what it was like to _live_ than even Anna possibly could. She wanted Elsa to have answers, but it was backwards. She was the one with answers. The only thing Elsa could ever tell her was how much she was loved. The rest was up to her.

For an instant, Anna felt like laughing. On top of everything else, Elsa had always needed and would always need her, just to have a life at all. But she couldn't laugh. There were too many other feelings inside her. And now she knew - she and Elsa were just going to have to figure it out together. An instant went by as that thought rolled around in her head, and then she laughed anyway. Being with Elsa, learning about everything _with_ her? That was the life they should have always had! There was no happier way for anything to be!


	14. Frost

Something was trying to distract Elsa from her sister. It was a sound, something in her ears, so distant she couldn't focus on it. Just as well. Focusing on anything else would have meant taking attention from being in Anna's arms. She should have known Anna would have other ideas. Right in the middle of a kiss, Anna paused and drew back slightly. Reluctantly, Elsa followed her sister's lead, looking towards the doorway.

Olaf stood there, waving cheerfully, his "personal flurry" drifting lazily over his head. "Hi, Anna! Hi, Elsa! Boy, it's great to see you guys!" He ambled over to give Anna a hug with his wooden arms. Anna just stared at him.

Elsa poked her nose gently, knowing full well what her sister was thinking. "You don't have to look so surprised, Anna. Olaf understands love. Don't you?" She smiled at her creation, giggling a little as his carrot-nose got caught on Anna's shirt and reaching over to gently disentangle him.

"Uh huh!" Elsa was struck by the little guy's voice. It was exactly how she'd always imagined Olaf would sound. And sure enough, he obviously liked warm hugs too. "I couldn't find you for awhile so I went sledding with Kristoff!" He leaned over to whisper conspiratorially in Anna's ear, though Elsa could hear clearly too. "I think the rocks were right about him and the woods."

Anna started giggling, but Elsa had no idea what it meant. She raised her eyebrows at them. "Rocks?"

"Yeah! They're his family! And they're love experts too!" Olaf was nodding eagerly, despite the explanation doing absolutely nothing to ease Elsa's confusion. Was there something wrong with how she'd put him together? She didn't have a clue how she'd done that in the first place. Now, after the fact, she couldn't even remember how she'd summoned up that little cloud of snow that was keeping him from melting in the summer weather.

Her whirlwind of thoughts was interrupted by Anna jumping in. "He means the rock trolls. They're the ones who told me how to thaw... I mean, well, you know, the act of true love. You said you knew them, remember?"

Elsa would have appreciated Anna's clumsy attempt to spare her feelings, but she was too busy remembering all too clearly. The trolls. The ones their parents had taken them to after she'd frozen Anna's head. Grandpabbie had taken the ice from Anna's head, taken Anna's memory of the magic away. He'd warned Elsa that fear was her enemy, a message that she was just beginning to realize had been badly misunderstood. Instead of being taught not to be afraid, she'd been taught to fear _herself_ and what damage she could do.

She was jolted out of her thoughts a second time by Olaf's hug. She smiled at the snowman, reaching down to lift him into her lap. There was just enough room left over with Anna there for him to fit. "I do remember." She carefully adjusted Olaf's head, which had slid rather weirdly to one side, marveling at her own magic that allowed him to exist at all. "There, that's better."

Anna giggled again, turning Olaf's nose the right way up. "You get out of shape so easily, Olaf!"

Olaf tried to hug them both at once, but his arms weren't long enough to do it until they leaned in as close as they could get to him. "Hey thanks!" He kept hugging until both his arms popped out of his body and were left hanging off their necks. Elsa winced, laughing with Anna as they each put one arm back into place. "I just go to pieces around you!"

Anna started laughing harder, and Elsa had to grab hold of her sister before she fell over and took Olaf with her. She was laughing too, of course. Olaf's innocent cheer was as infectious as Anna's irrepressible energy. And that was as it should be. He was made from a thousand memories of perfect moments from their childhood, before everything had gone so wrong. She didn't know exactly what it meant that he was alive, but it didn't matter, not really. There had even been something about him helping save Anna's life. "We love you too, Olaf."

"You guys are just the best!" He looked between them, his head going back and forth so fast that he shed a few snowflakes in the process. "Heyyyyy," he said, in his version of a sly voice, "did I interrupt something?"

Anna blushed, but Elsa just smiled at him. "What makes you think so?"

"Well," and he started ticking points off on his fingers, "when I came in, you were kissing, and Anna's sitting in your lap, and she's looking at you like she looks at Kristoff but _way_ happier, and you look really interested too just like he does!" He leaned in to whisper to her, "She doesn't know much about love so you probably gotta tell her what it means." The snowman winked.

"Hey!" Anna tried to pull Olaf away from Elsa's ear, but ended up with just his head. "Oops, sorry!" She quickly jammed it back into place. "And of course I love Elsa!"

Olaf clapped his hands. "Woooow! Are you gonna get married?"

The sisters blushed in unison, but it was Anna who answered first. "O-Olaf, it doesn't work like that, that's a whole different-!" She trailed off, visibly at a loss for how to even finish the sentence.

She was rescued from doing so by a knock on the door of the dining hall. Startled, Anna fell on her rear, Olaf landing on her. Elsa, ever calm when held up against the standard of Anna's flustered clumsiness, rose smoothly to her feet, reaching down to help Anna and Olaf up. "What is it?" she called out, in a voice whose assured calm she knew would test Anna's sense of reality. She smiled slightly, the thought of her sister's amazement at her ability to comport herself running through her mind.

The voice that answered sounded fairly flustered itself, even if it was just Kai. "Your Highness, the boat carrying Prince Hans of the Southern Isles has returned. It… seems they wanted nothing to do with him and wish for you to pronounce your own judgement."

"_Hans_?!" Olaf's silliness forgotten, Anna would have stormed right for the door if Elsa hadn't guessed before the fact to keep hold of her sister's hand, locking her in place with the force of common sense, if not any particular amount of authority. _As if I had any authority over Anna!_ Even in the moment of such troubling news, she wanted to giggle. Thinking about Anna had that effect on her an awful lot…

But time was going by and Kai was waiting for an answer. "Have him brought to the throne room, suitably guarded, and inform me when he is ready. I will attend to the matter." The formal, commanding tone felt deeply foreign after laughing with Olaf and Anna only moments before, and the seemingly endless hours spent thinking only of her sister. Speaking of whom- "Anna, please, be calm. He can hardly do either of us any harm under guard." He never could have done Elsa any harm at all if he hadn't caught her in the moment when she thought all was lost. And Anna was perfectly capable of defending herself, when she had the sense to!

Anna glowered at her. "I'm perfectly calm!" She crossed her arms, giving off an attitude Elsa could only describe as smoldering. She shook her head. Sulk as Anna might, she knew her sister would behave, for her sake if for no other reason.

Of course, Olaf wasn't going to be left out of the conversation. "Don't worry, Anna, I won't let him hurt you!" Elsa had to smile. The image of Olaf facing down Hans was comical, though also wonderfully endearing.

"It's alright, Olaf. Why don't you go find Kristoff?" Hopefully, that would keep him busy more than long enough to deal with this matter. Elsa couldn't bear the idea of subjecting him to what was probably going to be a very unpleasant confrontation. She could hardly bear the thought of subjecting herself either, but if she didn't, she knew Anna would go by herself, and that would definitely _not_ end well.

"Okay! Say, do you think he and Hans would be friends?" The snowman was already ambling away, his cheer completely undaunted by the darkened mood. "I wonder if Sven needs more carrots!" Elsa wasn't quite sure if Olaf was just saying random things that came into his adorable little head, or if carrots for Sven connected with Hans somehow. She sighed a little, knowing she wasn't going to have a chance to figure it out right this moment.

* * *

The throne room felt strangely dark and empty, despite being well-lit. Perhaps it had to do with the feelings of loss associated with this place. Maybe it was the somber tone of the dozen guards, or the way the evening light slanted through the windows. Maybe it had to do with the deceptively handsome figure standing in the middle of all those guards, standing tall and proud despite the manacles on his wrists. Elsa kept walking towards the throne, her dress sliding along the floor behind her. She kept her face utterly calm, smooth as ice. A quick glance, moving only her eyes, told her Anna was trying to do the same, though the anger was still more visible on her sister's face than was really proper. _Anna, please, don't make this any worse than it has to be._

To her surprise, Anna straightened herself slightly, managing even to wipe most of the glower and hurt from her features. It was as if she'd heard Elsa's thought. Or more likely, she'd seen Elsa's tiny motion of looking at her.

Elsa proceeded to the end of the room without ever looking directly at the prisoner, or anyone else for that matter. She sat slowly on the throne, remembering a thousand moments from much younger days, before closed doors and loneliness, but did not allow it to show. Anna needed her to be calm, to be strong. If only she knew that Elsa wanted only for Anna to be proud of her. Did she know?

The youngest Prince of the Southern Isles, fair-faced as he was, gave off a cold aura nothing like Elsa's gentle chill. No magic, just an air of disdain enough to make even Elsa shiver. She refused to let it show. "Am I to understand that you have been sent to be judged by those you have wronged, Prince Hans?" She fought down a shudder, repulsed by her own words. To speak with such disapproval felt unnatural, forced.

He answered with a smirk, a twisted parody of the winning smile Elsa had seen him level on Anna more than once not very long ago. "It seems so, Queen Elsa." His words were like slime. He glanced at Anna, standing next to her sister. "A pleasure to see you again, Princess Anna."

Elsa winced as Anna bristled at the insincere greeting. _Please, Anna… don't let him get to you._ "What would you have me do with you?"

"Why, given my choice, I would ask no more than the company of you and your charming sister, Queen Elsa." He knew he was fooling no one, that was clear. Elsa could see that he had no interest whatsoever in being here, any more than they wanted him. And yet he still chose to waste everyone's time by playing at being charming.

It was apparently too much for Anna. "You tried to kill her! You're lucky if she just throws you in the dungeon!"

The omission was not lost on Hans. "One can see all too clearly where your loyalties lie, Princess." Still that awful smirk! It was making Elsa's head hurt just looking at it. "Perhaps I misread you." He looked between them, once. "Could it be that your heart was never yours to give to me?"

Elsa recaptured Hans' attention with a burst of ice that exploded inches from his nose, showering his face with shards only just barely too small to cut. "Your conversation was with me, Prince Hans. And it is complete." She looked to the guards. "Take him to the dungeon and lock him there until I send for him."

"Wait!" At Hans' outburst, Elsa raised her hand, and the guards paused. "At least let me give you a reason not to simply dispose of me."

Elsa wished she could have shown him exactly what she thought of his words, as Anna was doing. "If you had taken the time to learn anything of me during your last visit, you would know that, unlike you, I am not given to... 'disposing'... of people." She couldn't quite repress the shudder this time. The idea that she, or anyone, could be so cruel was sickening.

He narrowed his eyes, and she realized as he spoke that she had dangerously misjudged him already. "You? Of course not." He motioned with his head to Anna, addressing her directly now. "I imagine you would rather have that pleasure for yourself than troubling your fragile pet with it, Princess."

Elsa felt as if her head might explode. It had been embarrassing when poor, innocent Olaf had mistaken her relationship with Anna, but also endearing. Hearing the same sentiment spoken in such twisted fashion- she barely grasped even the surface of Hans' insult, could only guess at how many levels of horrid implication lay beneath.

Apparently, Anna wasn't having the same problem, or at least not as much so. She couldn't believe the anger on Anna's face; she'd _never_ seen her sister like this. Anna stormed forward, ignoring Elsa's faint attempt to call her back, and grabbed Hans by the top of his shirt. The guards tensed, uncertain, but Anna was paying no attention. "Don't you ever talk to my sister like that again! I can't believe I ever liked you!"

Just for an instant, Elsa almost wanted to smile. Anna didn't even care what Hans had said about her. She was too busy defending Elsa. _I suppose if I had to be a "pet", I could do worse for a keeper._ But she sobered immediately. "Anna, that's enough. Put him down."

Anna looked down; Elsa realized that she had no idea she'd lifted Hans clear off the floor in her fiery outburst. She slowly let Hans go, though not _quite_ slowly enough to avoid causing him to land on his rump instead of his feet.

Hans was undaunted, his sneer also somehow smug, despite his position. "You're both children! A headstrong and impulsive keeper-" Elsa twitched when the very word she had thought of came from Hans' lips. "-with no idea of her own ability, and her innocent shut-in _sister_-" Another twitch, for he managed to convey a staggering amount of contempt in the word. "-who can barely use her power." He narrowed his eyes and smirked at them, managing to look rather imposing even sitting on the floor with Anna towering over him. "You need me."

Elsa stepped forward to grab Anna's arm before her sister could do anything else rash, looking down at Hans and shoving back the unreasonable desire for silence he inspired. "No, Prince Hans. It is you who need us. Until you choose to show the respect and courtesy due your peers, you will not be among them." She looked to the the guards, tugging Anna back, relieved that she didn't object. "Take him."

As Hans was dragged away, he shouted back at them, "You'll see! You can't survive without my help!" Anna tried to run after him, her face still twisted with anger, but she wasn't quite angry enough to pull away from Elsa. Elsa was quietly thankful, knowing full well there was no way she could physically hold Anna back. Not safely, at least, not without magic.

When he was finally gone, she turned to Anna, not trying to hide how shaken and upset she felt. "Anna, he's scared and desperate. Don't let him trick you into behaving as he would. Please..." She knew her tone was begging, but she didn't care. She needed Anna's strength, not Anna's fury.

She couldn't make sense of Anna's expression, and that scared her more than anything. What was Hans, that he could turn her sister into something so angry with just a few words? Then Anna answered her. "I won't let him hurt you, Elsa." And Elsa realized that Anna was no less frightened than she, and for much the same reason.

She looked around at the throne room. There was no more Hans and no more guards, but Kai was still waiting there, and she knew the room would not remain even so empty. Elsa had no desire to show anyone but Anna how she was feeling, and there were things to say that were not for anyone else's ears. "Anna, we should talk elsewhere."

Anna nodded, not questioning, for which Elsa was deeply grateful. She left the room, Anna following beside her. She looked back once, and saw that poor Kai was left there to wonder. His lost expression might have been enough to make her smile sympathetically at any other time, but there were no smiles in her in this moment - a terrifying thought by itself. She gave him what she hoped was a reassuring nod as they went out the door.


	15. Chaos

Chaos

Anna barely kept her composure long enough for Elsa to close the door of her room - their room, now - behind them. She started pacing all over, restless, the things Hans had said echoing in her head as if mocking her. She barely noticed Elsa sinking into a sitting position on the bed. "'Headstrong', I'll show him headstrong... who does he think he's calling impulsive... what does 'keeper' even mean anyway?" She had an inkling of the answer to that last, but dared not think on it.

"Anna, calm down." Elsa had that same pleading tone again, but Anna didn't really hear it. She couldn't remember ever being so angry! It wasn't even what he'd said about her, really. Sure, he'd left her to die, alone and frozen, but she'd gotten in a good punch to the face. And okay, maybe she _was_ a little excitable. Who could blame her, after being locked in the castle for so long? That she could have left if she'd really wanted to, that she'd stayed for Elsa, was a distant thought just now.

She faintly perceived Elsa calling her name again, but still her anger was too loud. Anyway, it wasn't what Hans had said about her, it was what he'd said to Elsa. Sure, Elsa _was_ innocent, but since when was that a bad thing? And fragile? Hadn't he seen her up on that mountain too? Not to mention, was calling Elsa a pet supposed to _mean_ something? He'd said it with the same sneering, suggestive (_of what?_) undertone as "keeper". It didn't even make _sense_!

She was finally jolted out of her furious pacing by Elsa's voice. "Anna, please!" It wasn't the volume that reached her; it wasn't that loud. It was the note of panicked desperation.

Anna froze in place. She'd heard that tone from Elsa once before, when she was weeping over Anna's frozen body. It was instantly clear to her what Elsa was seeing - It was as if Hans had taken Anna and replaced her with this furious stranger with not even a moment to spend noticing her sister's fear. She could practically hear Elsa's thoughts. _Anna, where did you go? Please, I need you! Anna!_

Fury forgotten, she rushed to the bed and sat down next to Elsa, latching on to her sister and holding on for dear life. "Elsa, I'm sorry! I'm right here!" She took note in some distant part of her brain of how quickly and easily Elsa nestled into her arms, all hints of the queenly authority she'd shown in the throne room utterly gone. How comfortable and happy having her there felt. How right. "Elsa, it's okay..."

Anna felt Elsa calm immediately, saw her relax, as if just having Anna holding her had set all right with the world again. "I had no idea he was so awful. Anna, I don't understand."

That wasn't hard to believe. Anna had barely understood herself. She'd watched Hans try to kill them both, but somehow his very attitude now was even worse. Everything he said was so _vicious_, so spiteful, as if it was their own faults for not letting each other die at his hands.

And even worse, Elsa's reaction was surreal. She'd been so composed in the throne room, but now she huddled in Anna's arms, practically cowering. Anna knew that her own anger, as bright as it burned, was always short-lived. But it had never occurred to her before that her sister could be so vulnerable, so helpless. It was one thing for Elsa to be lost and frightened because Anna wasn't there, but to see someone else do this to her defied all sense. Where was Elsa's smile?

As if Elsa had read _her_ thoughts this time, she looked up at Anna, her smile faint but present. "I'm alright, Anna." Hadn't Anna said just a second before that it was okay? And now Elsa was repeating it back to her. "I just needed a moment. And so did you." Elsa made no motion to pull away from her sister, though. She was obviously content to stay right where she was. And Anna wasn't going to complain. No amount of upset could ruin snuggling with Elsa.

Elsa didn't say anything for a long while after that, and Anna eventually became aware that her sister was asleep. She would have laughed out loud, except she didn't want to risk waking her. She'd done the same thing to Elsa less than an hour before! Were they both just that tired? _Is it that she feels safe with me?_ Okay, so it had been a really long couple of days, but it still felt a little weird for Elsa to just doze off like that. At the same time, it was hard to worry too much about something that made her so happy. And Elsa still felt really good to snuggle...

Her confusion was interrupted by a knock on the door. She gave Elsa an alarmed look, but the sleeping girl didn't stir. She looked to the door. "What is it?" she called, in the softest tone she thought could still be heard.

Kai's voice answered. "Princess?" He sounded surprised, which Anna supposed made sense; this was Elsa's room after all. "Your friend, the ice merchant, has asked to see you."

_Kristoff!_ Now there was someone she actually wanted to see. Without thinking about it, she jumped to her feet, easily carrying Elsa, who didn't so much as stir. Anna all but skipped to the door - she would have been skipping, except Elsa _was_ a little too heavy for that - and _ran_ down the hallway, totally ignoring poor Kai's bewildered expression.

She found her friend in the ballroom, now empty of people and music, save for Olaf and, of course, Kristoff himself. The two were speaking, but cut off when Anna ran in. Olaf, of course, just looked happy to see her, waving cheerfully. Kristoff, on the other hand, looked dumbfounded.

Oh, right. She was still carrying Elsa. Well, who cared! She ran right up to Kristoff to hug him, then paused six inches away when she realized abruptly that there was a sort of logistical issue there. Without anywhere to put a (still!) asleep Elsa down, her arms were kinda taken up. She made a face, frustrated, then almost jumped out of her skin when Kristoff just hugged her instead. His arms weren't so wide as, say, Oaken's, but it was enough for the task. "Uh, hi." He sounded as confused as he looked, too.

She giggled nervously. "Hi." It was actually the first time she'd seen Kristoff since she'd run off from kissing him to go skating with Elsa. "Um, sorry about Elsa, she kinda... fell asleep."

Olaf leaned in really close to Elsa's face, peering at her. "Ooo, what's it like to sleep?"

Anna exchanged a look with Kristoff, reminded of Olaf's equally adorable innocence about summer. "So, Kai said you were looking for me?"

"Oh! Well, I was just, you know, wondering how you were. You turned to ice and all that and then you ran off."

Anna peered at him. Kristoff was both looking at her and trying not to look like he was looking at her, and doing a pretty bad job of it. "Are you alright?"

Olaf tugged her dress, and she looked down at him. "Remember what I said when you looked out the window that time?"

Anna couldn't help but smile at Olaf's earnestness, even if she did know exactly what he was talking about. It had been less than a day ago, after all. _"Kristoff... loves me?" "Whoa, you really don't know anything about love, do you?"_ For some reason she couldn't name, the memory made her hug Elsa tighter. Thinking about love always led to Elsa first. Yes, Olaf had been talking about something different - _Is it different?_ - but she couldn't help it. Yet it made no sense to go from Olaf saying Kristoff loved her to thinking about how happy she was to have Elsa there.

It was so confusing! One second she was happy to see her friend, the next she was all mixed up again. She suddenly felt enormously awkward, facing Kristoff with Elsa asleep on her like this. It was so _silly_, and she couldn't quite laugh at it; it was also just a little too weird. "Hey, Olaf, why don't you take Kristoff and Sven sledding some more! I've gotta- um- put Elsa to bed!" Before she could make an even bigger fool of herself, she dashed for the doorway, faintly grateful somewhere deep inside that Elsa hadn't woken up. _Oh no, is she faking? Please, please, please, let her not be faking!_

Olaf and Kristoff stared after her as she tore out of the room, jaws hanging slightly open in unison. Kristoff finally looked at the snowman. "I'm not crazy to think she's acting really weird, right?"

Olaf nodded agreeably. His reply came in his usual cheerful tone. "Uh huh!"


	16. Dream

Anna leaned back against the door of Elsa's room, pushing it the rest of the way closed, breathing heavily. As easy as Elsa was to carry, doing so at a dead run all the way through the castle twice was a lot. _Why don't I just put her down?_ But she couldn't. Whether it was Hans' words themselves, or seeing Elsa react to them, what he'd said had unsettled her on some deep level.

_He didn't even say that much! Just some weird thing about Elsa being passive and me not. What did that even mean!?_ She tried to remember Hans' words, but kept coming up with "fragile pet" and "impulsive keeper". And that last thing he'd yelled, "You can't survive without my help!" It was as if he'd been looking at some completely other thing, talking about someone else.

She started pacing about the room, barely noticing that she was still carrying Elsa. She didn't even notice when Elsa's eyes opened, too busy muttering to herself. "What was he talking about..." Even when Elsa quietly nuzzled at her, she paid no heed.

* * *

Kristoff couldn't help wondering what was on Anna's mind. She was sure a weird girl, but that had been _really_ weird! If only Sven were here, he always seemed to know what people were thinking. "Olaf, did something happen today?"

"Oh yeah! I saw Anna kiss Elsa, then I tried to hug them and my arms came off, and we laughed and talked, and then Kai said Hans was back and Elsa told me to find you so I did!" Olaf's cheerfulness was simply irrepressible. "Whoaaa, do you think Hans made her act weird?" The snowman's eyes went wide. "I bet he came back to say he was sorry! That's why Anna looks so happy!" He sounded very pleased with his conclusion.

"_Hans_ is back?" Kristoff had trouble believing Olaf's happy idea of just why that might be, though he also wanted to smile at the little snowman noticing a sisterly kiss enough to mention it by itself. He remembered Anna kissing him really fondly. But this thing about Hans worried him.

"Yeah! You should go say hi, I bet he'd be really happy if you told him Anna's got a boyfriend and him being mean didn't keep her down!"

"I, uh, I doubt it." Was he Anna's boyfriend? Maybe seeing Hans was a good idea anyway, though. He could tell that lout to stay away from her.

* * *

Anna wanted to throw up her hands in frustration, but that would have meant dropping Elsa. "I just don't understand it!" Every time she thought she had maybe an inkling of Hans' meaning, she shied away. It was horrid, all of it. Even after all he'd done, she just couldn't grasp someone behaving like that. It wasn't as if she didn't know there was evil in the world, but to have it come stare her in the face like that, with subtle implications instead of simple statements, was completely beyond her experience.

Her heart almost stopped in guilty surprise when Elsa answered her exclamation, her sister's voice coming as a whisper from where her head rested on Anna's shoulder. "I don't either, Anna. But he was talking to you as if he thought you would."

"I didn't mean to wake you up!" Anna looked around, saw she was too far from the bed to set Elsa on it, tried to set her sister on her feet instead.

"It's alright, Anna, I'm comfortable here." Anna's head could have exploded. How did Elsa always manage to find such simple, happy things to say? Was this even the same Elsa who'd been hidden behind that very door over there for so many years? This gorgeous, elegant sorceress who kept giving herself over to Anna so completely? This was the Elsa she'd always so desperately wanted, but had all but given up believing she'd ever see again.

She shook her head, trying to clear it. Every time she thought of Elsa, it kept coming with noticing her sister's beauty. And somehow even _that_ sounded almost like something Hans had said. _"Could it be that your heart was never yours to give to me?"_ She was beginning to realize that he'd meant to suggest that it was Elsa she loved.

* * *

Kristoff stared at the disgraced Prince through the dungeon bars, face confused. It was pretty hard to figure out how someone could be so, well, mean. The guy looked nice enough, when he was smiling, but then he started sneering and it just sent shivers up and down his spine! "So, um, do you like reindeer?"

There was that sneer again. "Oh yes, I've heard rumors about you. The ice merchant who kissed the princess. Tell me, did you know you had competition? They certainly caught me off guard."

"What are you talking about? They put you on that ship right after the storm cleared."

Hans laughed. Kristoff could see how Anna had been so easily fooled by him. She wasn't the smartest about guys. Probably couldn't even tell how selfish this guy was. He shook off the thought so he could listen to what Hans was saying. "Not me, you simpleton. The queen."

"What?" Kristoff wondered if he'd misheard. He wasn't so full of himself that he thought what he and Anna had was for-sure true love or anything, but now this guy was saying something like that about Anna's sister! "That's crazy!"

The smirk on Hans' lips was horrible to look at. Raw contempt dripped from his features. "Any fool could see it just by looking at them. I was right to dismiss the queen. The real power is with that girl you think cares for you. My only mistake was not waiting to make sure she was dead."

Kristoff felt nauseous. And for some reason, he was remembering Anna running in with Elsa in her arms. Olaf's words echoed in his head. _"I saw Anna kiss Elsa!"_ Was Hans making some kind of sense? Now he really wished Sven was here. "You, uh, don't know what you're talking about. Stay away from them!" Kind've a stupid thing to say to someone locked in a dungeon, but he didn't care. He turned and walked towards the stairs. _Reindeers are __**so**__ much better than people._

Behind him, Hans yelled, "You're nothing to her, boy! We're all nothing!"


	17. Dance

As much as she enjoyed the feel of Anna's arms around her, Elsa was beginning to feel restless. It wasn't so much that she wasn't comfortable, as that Anna's agitation was starting to get to her. She'd almost forgotten how much she'd tended to mirror Anna's moods when they were children. Anna was always the leader, always reckless, her capacity for finding fun boundless. But now Anna's pacing was getting to be a bit much.

"Anna, what did Hans say that was so awful?" It hurt to see Anna so upset. She seemed to have calmed down before, yet now she was worked up again.

"It's not what he said, it's what he meant! He was trying to say I was in love with y-you..." Elsa felt Anna's whole body tense at the last word.

She wanted to laugh. Anna was only figuring that out now? And besides, "Don't you love me, Anna?" She reached up, touched Anna's cheek with fingers she knew were chilled by her sister's standards. And Anna's skin was just as warm to her. She could wrap herself in that warmth and drift away in it.

"Of course I do, Elsa! What kind of question is that? But he meant it different! Like- like the kind I thought he had for me." Even in her upset, Anna couldn't quite help nuzzling against Elsa's hand just a little.

Now Elsa just smiled. "What is the difference?"

"You're my sister!"

"And?" Elsa wasn't oblivious to Anna's discomfort. But to her, the issue Anna was trying to raise was nothing but a distant suggestion from a world Elsa had never really been a part of in the first place. She didn't _want_ there to be some "other" kind of love that she couldn't have for Anna. She loved Anna with all her heart.

And she knew Anna. There was no use simply saying that to her. Sometimes, she just had to reach a thought on her own. All she said was, "And- and-"

Elsa couldn't quite repress a soft giggle, relieved to see Anna actually stopping to think. She'd been taking Hans much too seriously, seeming not to realize that Elsa's own reaction had been much more to Anna's anger than anything Hans had said. Seeing Anna so upset was frightening! But now she had a chance to have fun with this instead. "Do you want to kiss me, Anna?"

"Well... y-yes, but what does that have to do with-?" She was abruptly cut off when Elsa reached up and caught her in a kiss.

Elsa had meant to be teasing, but she was caught off guard when Anna pulled her closer and returned the kiss with a ferocity she'd never imagined. She was instantly helpless, melting into Anna's arms, overwhelmed. There was such _fire_ in Anna's eyes, passion and desire all mixed up with desperation and fear and devotion. Elsa knew that she needed Anna, but it had never been so clear how much Anna needed her.

When Anna finally pulled away, Elsa was at a complete loss. It seemed like there should be something she did next, but she had no idea what that could be. She kept her eyes on Anna, waiting, but Anna just stared back at her. Elsa felt Anna trembling, but there was nothing there for her to say or do to help. _Anna, you're the one who kissed me like that. Please, I don't know what to do!_ She didn't quite say it aloud, afraid that Anna would let her go. Even her thoughts were a whisper. _Anna, I'm here, I'm yours... Please, do something... _Say_ something!_

Finally, after too many long moments, Anna all but ran to the bed and sat down, setting Elsa in her lap and hugging her rather tight. Elsa gasped for breath, not even realizing she'd been holding it. She nuzzled gently at her sister, trying to be comforting. The silence had stretched on so long that when Anna finally spoke, it was jarring, though still a relief.

"Elsa, you're not mad at me, are you?"

Of all the questions Anna could have asked, Elsa couldn't think of anything less sensible. "I kissed you first, Anna. Don't turn into Kristoff on me now."

She'd meant it as a tease, but when she saw Anna recoil, she realized she'd misstepped. Was this Anna? Her sister who'd tried so desperately to sound happy while begging her to come out from behind a locked door for years on end? It was as if that kiss had turned the whole world upside down! "Don't talk about Kristoff like he's stupid!"

Elsa didn't even try to argue the point. "Anna, what's wrong? Please, tell me. Did I do something wrong? Is it just what Hans said?"

Anna hugged her tighter. "I- You kissed me, and then I wanted to kiss you back so I did, and now I'm scared because it feels like Hans was right about us."

That was it? "Well, what did he say, really?" She went through the memory of the conversation in her head. "He said you loved me more than him." She smiled. "I certainly hope that's true. He called me a pet, and you my keeper. I'm not sure what he meant by it exactly, but if it means that you look after me and that I need you, that's certainly true. He called you headstrong and impulsive, which you are, said you don't know your own ability, which I think is true, said I was innocent, which I guess I am, and that I can't use my powers very well." She shrugged. "There's lots I still have to learn, and I couldn't have even started without you." She shook her head. "And then he said we wouldn't survive without him. I don't know if that's true, but I'm curious enough what he was talking about not to just dismiss it when he had everything else figured out just like that."

Anna stared at her, and it took Elsa a moment to identify her sister's expression: Pride. Anna was proud of her. A warm glow spread through her at the thought; she almost missed what Anna was saying. "I guess so. That's not what he meant by 'pet', though..." She felt Anna shiver. "I don't understand it exactly, but it wasn't very nice, I know that. And besides, I need you too!"

Elsa nuzzled at Anna again, acutely aware of how _good_ it felt to be so near her, no matter the mood. It would be a very long time before she got used to this, if she ever did. "I know you do, Anna." She stared up at Anna, wondering again just where her sister could take her, if only she dared. "Anna?"

"Yeah?"

"I don't want to talk about Hans anymore. We'll deal with him if he becomes a problem, but I just want to be with you. Anna, I've missed you so much! The world will wait just a little while for us, now that you're here. I can be queen of Arendelle tomorrow... right now all I want is this."

The effort of saying it all was exhausting. Her eyes drifted shut, her body relaxing into Anna's hold. Distantly, she heard Anna's answer. "That's what I want too, Elsa!" She wasn't sure why she was suddenly so tired. Ever since she'd woken with Anna beside her, she'd been so terribly exhausted. It was as if all the years of fear and loneliness were weighing down on her, as if she hadn't slept in all that time. But now Anna was here. She knew Anna would be strong for her. All Anna had ever needed to be amazing was not to be locked away from her sister. It didn't matter if she slept. Anna was still there.

_The door's open now, Anna..._ The thought carried her into sleep.

* * *

Elsa bolted upright from her slumber in a cold sweat - literally. There were little gemdrops of ice falling out of her dress. She was so overwhelmed with horror that she couldn't even scream.

There was a split second of absolute nothingness, then Elsa felt Anna's arms around her. Anna! Anna was here! Anna was alright! She instantly buried her face in her sister's neck, sobbing. "Anna… Anna, you're okay…"

"Elsa, what's wrong? You look awful!" Elsa couldn't see her sister's face, but she could hear the worry in her voice.

She couldn't answer right away. She needed a moment to catch her breath, to let her heart stop pounding so hard. Anna was patient, of course. Finally, she took a gasping breath. "I- I dreamed you were still frozen..." The very truth that had let her rest, stolen away by a nightmare. And it felt so real...

"Elsa, I'm not frozen." Anna's voice was _firm_, cutting through the fear like a saw through ice. "I'm alright. I'm here." She felt Anna's hands on her shoulders. "Elsa, look at me." Half-unwillingly, Elsa lifted her face from Anna's neck and looked at her.

Anna was _smiling_. And just like that, most of the fear simply melted away, leaving her still shaking, but in control of herself again. _How did I ever survive without you, Anna?_

"I have an idea!" Anna hopped out of the bed, pulling Elsa with her. Elsa's heart leapt. Anna's ideas were always such fun! She almost felt like a child again, caught up in her sister's enthusiasm and excitedly waiting for the chance to impress Anna with her magic.

* * *

Anna led her to the great ballroom. She stopped, took a breath, and took both Elsa's hands in her own. She didn't say anything. She just began to dance. Elsa's breath caught when she recognized the steps. It was a _pas de deux_. Anna was the _danseur_, and she the ballerina.

Midway through a flawless _adagio_, Elsa had to ask, "Anna, where did you learn how to dance like this?" Elsa couldn't believe how effortlessly Anna led her across the ballroom floor. It felt like a dream, a beautiful one. She was helpless in Anna's hold, matching her sister's steps with a simple grace born of quiet confidence.

"I didn't! I'm just following you!" Elsa couldn't help a tiny giggle. There was not a bit of "following" in Anna's movements. Deny it as she might, Anna was a mistress of the dance floor. She kept staring into Elsa's eyes, making Elsa feel like she was melting. She couldn't even tell what she was seeing, only that she couldn't bear for this moment to ever end.

"_Let it go..._" she whispered, her heart singing, fear utterly forgotten.

* * *

Some distance below, a smoldering, sneering presence saw snow gently falling down the stairway. With no wind, no storm to stir it, it simply gathered on the steps and at the base. The presence smirked. Proof at last.

"So I was wrong. There was someone who loved you, Princess. Go ahead. Show her happiness. And I'll show her the strength you can't."

He flinched as a guard glanced towards him. He would have to watch that. Talking to himself was no way to regain the privilege due him.


	18. Whisper

Anna idly ran her fingers through Elsa's hair, holding her sister tightly to her. Elsa was asleep again, of course. They had danced for hours, lost in one another. Anna's memory was a delicious haze of joy, within which moments of Elsa's flawless grace and elegant motion mixed with countless kisses and time spent simply staring into her eyes. Every second with Elsa revealed a new height of happiness she hadn't known was possible. Even now, lying in bed with Elsa resting in her arms, it just wouldn't stop.

_She's mine..._ Anna had stopped trying to understand the thought some time before. It felt too right. Elsa was hers, and no one, _no one_ else could have her. But now, as Elsa slept, it began to nag at her again. Anna wove her fingers into and through Elsa's beautiful silken hair, pondering despite herself. There was something here she couldn't quite grasp, something important. It wasn't nearly enough to distract her from the all the joy she felt, but it did keep her awake.

For a few minutes, she got lost again, fascinated with the thousand tiny sensations of such little things as the rise and fall of Elsa's chest as she breathed, the feel of her skin. She distantly noticed that Elsa's magically-summoned dress had melted mostly away, though thanks to the bedsheets there was nothing to see. And there was that smile on Elsa's lips, and that wonderful scent of snow about to fall.

But like a phantom itch, the thought of what it meant to have Elsa wouldn't let her be. She sighed. She could only think of one person who might have the answers she wanted, and she was _sure_ Elsa wouldn't approve. _Sorry, Elsa... I'll come right back._

It took Anna a good ten minutes to untangle herself from Elsa without waking her. Just getting her hand out of Elsa's hair proved surprisingly difficult. The silken blonde strands, so pliant as she'd toyed with them, tended to tangle with each other and grip her fingers. And shifting Elsa's head off her chest was an exercise in patience, never one of Anna's strongest suits.

Finally she managed to slip out of bed, then paused as it occurred to her what would happen if Elsa awoke while she was gone. That nightmare before had been enough to set off Elsa's powers, and that was with Anna right there. If she wasn't there, the fear would come back. Elsa wouldn't be able to help thinking that everything that had happened had just been a longing dream, and who knew what might happen before Anna could come back to help her? Probably not anything that couldn't be undone, but she still didn't want Elsa to go through that fear again, even for a moment.

After a few moments of thought, she drew back the sheets just a little, exposing Elsa's bare shoulders and upper arms, but no more. Then she took a small chocolate from a pocket in her dress and set it next to Elsa's nose, so it would be the first thing she saw on waking. _There._

* * *

Anna shivered as she reached the bottom of the stairwell. It was _cold_ down in the dungeon, a dank chill nothing like Elsa's soft coolness. The flickering torchlight gave her no hints where to look for the person she sought. A whispered query to the single, obviously bored guard both gave the guard a considerable jolt and directed her to the cell at the far end of the corridor. She shivered again. _Why do we even _have_ a dungeon? There's no one else here!_

As she approached the cell, the familiar voice spoke. He had that same perfect cadence, just as when they'd first met. No sneer, no smirk, no cloying insincerity. Even behind prison bars, he was so handsome, so dashing. So charming. "Princess Anna! I've been expecting you! I knew you wouldn't forget about me!"

"Prince Hans." Anna did her best to sound formal, cold. It wasn't easy. She was caught between anger and an attraction she couldn't help. Her heart was pounding in her chest. It was like looking at Kristoff, only more so. It was even a little like looking at Elsa. "You said something before that I want to ask you about."

Hans bowed, just deep enough that it could have been a genuine gesture, just shallow enough to leave it in question. "It's simple, Princess. You've both been locked away a very long time. You need the help of someone more experienced."

She blinked. "What? No, not that. The other thing! About me, and Elsa! You called her a- a 'pet'."

She watched as Hans took a step back, confusion crossing his features. Then what she thought might be impatience. "Oh, Anna." She cringed, hearing both the words and tone Elsa used come from him. That same calm, patient amusement. And that smirk, the one he'd worn as he'd said those very words, and spilled water on the fire that was keeping her alive. "I thought you already understood that much, at least." He walked all the way up to the bars, as close to her as he could get. "She _is_ yours, isn't she?"

Anna recoiled from his approach, answered without thinking. "Yeah, she is!"

He gave her no chance to think about it. His tone was relentless. "Your sister. Your responsibility. You lose your way without her, but she loses all control without you. She might as well be dead. How could she not belong to you? She's nothing alone."

"Stop!" It was too much to take in at once. She wanted to run, but refused to give him the satisfaction.

* * *

Upstairs, sleepy eyes fluttered slowly open. Losing the warmth of the body she'd fallen asleep on had interrupted her rest. The coolness of the air fell on her shoulders, her arms. The sheets were pulled back. Had opening the door been a dream after all?

Her eyes focused, and she saw the chocolate. There was no chocolate in here, unless- A small smile. It wasn't a dream. Anna had been here. Then a frown. Where was she?

_Oh no..._ Elsa threw back the covers, her power reforming her dress around her, and strode for the door.


	19. Truth

Kristoff paced restlessly back and forth in the stable, Sven's eyes following him as the reindeer chewed a mouthful of leaves. "I don't get it, Sven! I think Hans thinks Anna only cares about Elsa! You know, like just her and nobody else." He glanced at his friend, but Sven just kept chewing. "Okay, okay, I mean just her and not me. But I don't think that's right!" He groaned as Sven thoughtfully picked up another mouthful. "Come on, I need some help here! What's he mean about Elsa, anyway?"

The reindeer rolled his eyes. "Don't give me that look. I know Elsa's important to her! I think Hans is saying something else." Sven snorted. "I don't _know_ what, Sven! I don't even know what he's doing back here! It's not like they're going to listen to him." Another eyeroll. "What, you don't think they'd fall for his whole 'prince charming' thing again, do you?"

He had the distinct impression Sven was laughing at him. "You're right, that's crazy. But something's going on, and I'm gonna find out what! _Someone_ has to save Anna from herself." He glared at what was now _definitely_ Sven laughing. "Well who else is gonna do it, you?" He stopped, grinned weakly. "Not that I don't know you can handle it, buddy, but I kinda wanna do this one myself."

* * *

"'Stop'?" Hans smiled at her, charming again in an instant. "My apologies, Princess. I had no idea the truth was such a burden." He even managed to sound sincere.

Anna knew not to believe he meant a word of it. "What do you want?" She couldn't help wondering what he thought this would get him. She certainly wasn't going to trust him again, and neither would Elsa!

He shrugged. "I told you what I want. But I'd understand if you weren't paying attention at the time. You were dying, after all."

He seemed ready to say more, but Anna couldn't stand him speaking so casually about it. "You _left_ me there to die! You didn't even know there was any way to save me, and you still didn't even _pretend_ to care!"

To her disbelief, he laughed. She clenched her fists, trying to hold on to her temper. "Come now, Anna. We both misunderstood the situation, there's no point denying that now. Had I known, I wouldn't have bothered with the blade. Why not let her see you as you struggled to reach your ice merchant, let her watch him fail? No sacrifice to melt your frozen heart, no one left to tell anyone my true intentions, and she dies of guilt. I would have taken Arendelle by doing nothing at all."

"Shut _up_!" Anna couldn't take any more. She ran to the bars, trying to reach through to grab him, punch him, something, but he simply backed away, infuriatingly calm, still with that perfect smile of his. "You can't- Kristoff- Olaf said- You don't-! Stop talking about hurting her! Say what you want about me but leave Elsa alone!" Distantly, she realized the bars were getting very hot in her hands for some reason, and let go. "You're a monster!"

"Am I?" He came back up to her, staring her in the eyes. She glared back at him. "Why weren't you there when I found your sister on the mountain? How did she come to freeze your heart? What _did_ you do to her to make her angry enough to nearly kill Weselton's men?" Anna gaped at him, speechless, struggling for words. But before she could find any, another voice came.

"She tried to reach out to me." Anna spun around to see Elsa coming down the stairs. She felt like the wind had been knocked out of her. Her sister was _beautiful_. There was a regality about her, and a sort of calm, considered anger. Anna was momentarily terrified.

But Elsa wasn't pausing to notice that. She was still speaking to Hans. "You did the same. You said, 'Don't be the monster they fear you are.' It was good advice, even if you didn't mean a word of it." She stopped when she reached Anna's side, sending a shiver through her. "You also stopped that arrow from hitting me. I don't think you're as cruel as you want Anna to believe, Prince Hans." Anna stared at her sister, but Elsa wasn't done. "I think you took your opportunity when you saw it, that ambition overcame your better sense, and that your bitterness now comes from hopelessness, not hatred."

Anna couldn't believe what she was hearing. Was Elsa defending him? Anger rose in her chest, but she shoved it desperately back down. She didn't want to be mad at Elsa. Not now, not after that dance. It had been so magical...

* * *

_Adagio_. _Pirouette_. _Adagio_. _Penché_, _lift_. _Variation_. _Coda_. _Entrée_. _Variation_. Anna remembered the steps she'd been taught, the names for them and the stages of the dance, but no one had ever told her what actually dancing them with someone properly would be like. Her body moved of its own accord, leading Elsa flawlessly; she was lost in Elsa's eyes. There was no music, but she could hear it in her head anyway.

She'd never felt anything like this. So much happiness, with such an air of mystery about it. Elsa's hands in hers. Elsa's body against hers. The empty air for instants at a time as she would spin Elsa away, only to bring her back again. And Elsa never missed a single step. Not one!

Anna couldn't help herself. She started giving Elsa little kisses every time she came near enough. She leaned over Elsa as her sister bent back into the _penché derrière_. When the dance dictated they rise again, Anna hesitated just enough to bring Elsa's lips to her own again, fascinated and entranced by the sensation. She couldn't get enough of it. Elsa didn't seem to mind, returning every kiss.

Finally enthusiasm got the better of her attempt at gracefulness, or maybe all the time Elsa had been guiding her and she'd finally distracted her too much for it to keep up. She misjudged a step, and Elsa fell back, Anna landing atop her. She opened her mouth to apologize, but Elsa kissed her first.

They stayed that way for awhile, just being in each others' arms, until by some unspoken signal, Anna got to her feet and pulled Elsa up with her. They began to dance again. Anna had no idea what was happening, or why or how, but she didn't and couldn't care. Nothing mattered but Elsa. Her beautiful Elsa.

* * *

Elsa watched as Hans recoiled from what to her had been simple observations. She knew Anna wouldn't understand yet, but there would be time to explain later. "Don't be a fool, girl. I simply didn't want to let that Duke take the credit for getting rid of you."

Anna interrupted before she could answer. "Elsa, what are you doing?"

She turned to Anna, taking Anna's hands in hers, remembering fondly how Anna had done the same in the ballroom. "Anna, wouldn't you rather take the chance that he _can_ help us then let him just stay here?"

She felt like crying when Anna averted her eyes. "We're doing fine by ourselves! I don't want any help with you, Elsa, I want to keep learning about each other the way we've been doing!"

"Forgive me for interrupting, Princess," Hans said, "but I would never think to tell you how to court your pet. It is the rest of the world, beyond your moments together, that should concern you."

Elsa grimaced, knowing before it happened what was coming. Sure enough, Anna ran for the bars again, reaching through to grab Hans, who simply stepped away. She had the distinct impression this was not the first time Anna had tried it. "Stop talking like you know anything about us! Why do you keep calling her that!"

Hans smiled, that kindly expression that had so easily fooled Anna before, the one that was so flawlessly sincere it had made Elsa uneasy when she first met him. "Because it is the truth. Anna, you are the only one who doesn't accept it."

Shaking her head, Elsa reached for Anna's arm, noticing that there was a great heat to her sister's skin. Was she feverish? "You are being needlessly harsh, Prince Hans. Could you not as easily say that she cares for me and still make your meaning clear?"

"No." The sisters both flinched at the sharp tone. "I do not choose to be kind to either of you. You don't deserve it."

Anna's fists clenched, but Elsa pulled her away, thankful when Anna didn't resist. "Then until you do so choose, there is nothing further to say." She turned, deliberately causing her dress to sweep around and billow upwards, and led Anna with her to the stairs.

She almost missed it when Hans called after them. "Have a care, Queen Elsa. Fire can melt ice."


	20. Motion

Anna held on to her composure until the top of the stairs, but she couldn't contain herself anymore. "I can't believe him!" She couldn't remember ever feeling so angry. Elsa's hand on her arm was soothing, but it wasn't enough. "He can't keep saying those things!"

"He wants you to be angry, Anna." Elsa turned to face her sister, hugging Anna tightly to herself. "And isn't he right? You do care for me."

Once again, Elsa's hold, Elsa's presence, calmed some of the anger. There was just so much of it! She felt so _hot_ inside, like a fire was burning inside her. It wasn't as if Elsa wasn't right. Anna did love her, even in the way Hans implied (_What way?_). She'd admitted it, even before that dance. And then there had been a kiss, and scattered moments of fear spaced between something she could only call desire. She didn't just need Elsa. She _wanted_ Elsa (_My Elsa_). And the thought of Hans' snide disdain was making her angrier again. _Why shouldn't I love Elsa? Why can't he just let it be? Why does he have to call it things and make it sound wrong to care about my sister!?_

Her thoughts were interrupted by Elsa. "Anna, something's wrong." Her sister was looking at her with concern, confusion. "You feel so warm. And look..." Elsa held out an arm. Her dress, which Anna knew was made from spun ice, was dripping. Elsa's arm was bare to the shoulder, and the rest of it was looking a bit patchy too. Anna could even see new strands of ice forming as Elsa tried to mend the holes, but they were turning to water everywhere Anna was too close. There was even steam rising in a couple of spots.

"Wh-what?" Anna looked all around, but there was nothing to explain the heat that was melting Elsa's ice. It made no sense to her. That dress had stayed in one piece after a lot more than a few seconds of snuggling! And it didn't look like there was anything wrong with Elsa's powers. Her skin was still cool to the touch.

Elsa tried to put a hand on her cheek, but Anna recoiled instantly. It was like an electric shock! On the rest of her body, Elsa's touch was just cool, but her palm was the coldest thing Anna had ever felt. Elsa yanked her hand away instantly. "A-Anna! It burns!"

The anger was forgotten. Now all Anna felt was fear. Was she hurting Elsa, somehow? She backed away a step, staring down at herself. "Elsa, what's happening?"

"I don't know." Elsa reached for her, and Anna forced herself not to recoil. Elsa's hand fell on her arm. The touch was freezing cold, but steam rose from it. "You're burning..." Elsa stepped up to her again, faster than she could back away, and even without direct contact steam began to rise.

Then the steam stopped, and Anna let out a tiny breath. "Elsa-" Then she actually looked at her sister. All she could think of to say was, "Um, your dress..." Elsa followed her gaze, looking down at herself to see she was now wearing only undergarments. The dress had melted completely away. Anna blushed, but couldn't quite bring herself to avert her eyes.

Fortunately, Elsa quickly summoned the dress back into being, ice weaving itself about her. "Anna, how do you feel?"

"Well, I don't really... I mean, you were n-" She felt heat rising into her face again, her blush deepening. "That wasn't what you meant, was it..."

Her sister gave her a slight smile. "Not quite." Elsa kissed Anna's cheek gently. "Being afraid always made my magic show whether I wanted it to or not. I didn't know what it was at first, just that strange things were happening when I felt a certain way." She shook her head. "You got angry at Hans, and then this."

Anna saw the implication immediately. "Are you saying I have powers too? Elsa, that's crazy!" Her head was spinning. Hadn't Hans said that she didn't know her own ability? But how could he have known something like that, even if it were true?

No, it couldn't be! _Elsa_ was the one with magic, the special one. From the moment she'd found out about Elsa's powers, Anna had been fascinated by them. Even when she was in the middle of being scared to death because she was in the middle of freezing to death, there was a little tickle of wonder at the back of her mind. The ice had even helped her stop Hans' sword at that last moment! Her heart had burst into song as she watched Elsa melt the fjord, knowing it was being together again that made it possible. Anna didn't want any powers of her own. There was already so much to explore about Elsa, so much she wanted to spend their lives together learning!

"I don't think it is," Elsa was saying. "Anna, there's so much we still don't understand about my magic, and I was born with it. It only makes sense that you could have been too." She took Anna's hands, not giving her a chance to draw away again. "There's more..."

* * *

Elsa wandered restlessly about the halls of the palace, bored. There was so much noise and rushing, and people were just ignoring her as they went by. Where was Mama? Where was Papa? No one even was even telling her to stay in her room!

She tried making some ice for fun, but all that came out was a few snowflakes and a bit of blue light. She couldn't do it right without Mama! Ever since Mama started getting bigger, Elsa could make so much more snow! Pouting, she tried to make the adults notice her, but they all just kept going. Even the big woman who helped her when Mama wasn't there - her name was something hard that had a 'guh' sound - just patted her on the head as she went by.

Since she couldn't find anything else, she went back to her room, stomping her feet all the way. Feeling very alone, she grabbed her snowman doll. "You're Olaf!" she declared firmly, hugging the doll as tight as she could.

A while went by while she played with Olaf, then Papa came in. "Papa!" Elsa jumped up and ran to him, giggling as he swept her right off the ground and gave her a big hug! "Papa, Papa, wanna play?!"

He laughed, so she giggled with him. "Not right now, Elsa. There's something very special I have to show you."

She wasn't sure what 'speshul' meant, but he looked and sounded really really happy, so it was good for sure! She put her arms around Papa's neck as he carried her to his and Mama's room.

Elsa looked around every which way as Papa went through the door. There was Mama in bed, and she looked really happy too! And Mama was holding a blanket. Papa set her down next to Mama, and Mama smiled really big at her. "Come meet your sister, Elsa."

'Sister' was a new word too, but Elsa sort of thought it meant a new baby. Curious, she looked into the blanket Mama was holding, and a tiny scrunched-up face looked back at her. It had blue eyes, just like hers! And they were really bright, too, like looking at a lamp! Then Mama was talking again. "Elsa, this is Anna. She's your little sister."

Elsa felt a little happy tickle in her tummy, like she just ate chocolate. "Hi, Anna!" She reached towards the little hand she could see just under the blanket.

Her hand touched Anna's. She felt like something inside her came out, all the way around, and saw a whole lot of blue light fill the whole room and a little ice form on the ceiling. She stared at it. She'd never made that much light or ice at once before!

Then Anna started crying, and Papa was lifting her up again, away from Anna. Elsa started to cry too. She didn't want to go away yet! The tears were making everything blurry, but she saw the baby's blanket getting bright just like the eyes. "Papa, wanna stay! Papa!"

Papa didn't stop until he took her right out of the room. "Elsa, it's alright. It's alright." He kept rocking her back and forth, so she stopped crying. Papa was there and said it was okay, so it was. She wiped her eyes, and wondered why Papa's hand looked blue.


	21. Fear

Anna stared at Elsa for a long time after she stopped talking. Her voice, when she finally managed to say something, was barely better than a whisper. "You mean... it was always like this?" She could barely breathe. "They did that to you right from the beginning?"

Elsa hugged Anna tight. Somewhere in the back of her mind Anna wondered whether her sister felt the burning heat inside her, or if it was an illusion of her own thoughts, or if maybe Elsa's ice protected her form it. "Don't judge Father too harshly, Anna. He was only trying to protect you."

"Protect me?! By taking you away? And what about protecting you!" Anna realized she hadn't been angry at Hans at all. What she was feeling now was a hundred times as powerful. Messing with her feelings about Elsa was one thing, but the idea that their separation had gone so far back, run so deep was maddening! The thought of someone, even her father, trying to keep her from being with Elsa drove her crazy.

There was no anger in Elsa's voice. There wasn't any fear either, or regret, or sadness. She was just calm, and Anna knew it would calm her too, if she let it. She tried to hug Elsa in return, and discovered she already was, her arms so tight around her sister that they ached from the effort. "He didn't know keeping us apart would make it worse, Anna. No one did. Everyone just thought they were keeping us both safe, even me." She nuzzled gently at Anna, leaving a trail of cold along Anna's skin. "It wasn't so bad as all that. When Mother saw you weren't hurt, she made Father bring me back. They let me hold you." A happy shiver went through Anna at Elsa's smile. "Your first word was my name. You even walked the first time to come to me."

Anna buried her face in Elsa's hair, taking in the scent of freshly fallen snow, the gentle chill. She felt trapped, between desperate frustration and the desire to just forget it all, forget _everything_, and be with Elsa. "Elsa, I just don't understand! If I have powers too, why didn't they ever show? And how could Hans possibly know about it? I don't want _any_ of this! I just want you!"

Elsa's smile widened. "But you have me. I'm here, Anna. Nothing is going to take me away." She touched Anna's cheek lightly, using just the tips of her fingers.

Anna had to smile. It was hard to do anything else with Elsa looking at her like that. "I guess we always really were meant to be together, huh?"

"Oh, Anna." And where from Hans, those words had stung, hearing them from Elsa was wonderful. Then Elsa's tone turned teasing. "If you really want to marry Kristoff, I won't stop you."

"Wow!" said a third, very familiar voice. "You're gonna marry Kristoff, Anna?" Olaf ran up to them, enthusiastic as always. "Can I help?!"

Anna blushed a bright red, almost matching her hair. "No, no, Olaf, Elsa was just teasing!" She sat down on the floor and hugged the snowman, genuinely happy to see him despite her embarrassment. Elsa sat too, and Anna shifted slightly to the side so they could hug Olaf together.

He returned the hugs as best he could with his short arms, of course. At least this time they didn't come loose! "Ohhh!" He pondered that for just a moment, then nodded. "So you're gonna marry Elsa!"

Anna stared at him, at an instant loss. She knew Olaf wouldn't say something like that unless he had a reason to. She glanced at Elsa, but her sister was just smiling, as if the idea hadn't struck her any more oddly than it had Olaf. She looked back at him. "Why do you think that, Olaf?"

"Hmmmm." Olaf flopped forward onto his front, propping up his head with his little wooden hands. "You kissed her a lot, you slept in her bed, you look the most happiest of all when she's there, and you were carrying her around and didn't put her down when you saw Kristoff!" He nodded firmly. "So you like Elsa best!"

The recitation left Anna speechless. To her relief, Elsa came to her rescue. "Sisters don't get married, Olaf." She was smiling brilliantly. Anna wondered distantly if Olaf's "idea" was responsible. "That's for people who are in love."

Olaf nodded happily. "Yeah, like you and Anna!"

Anna was beginning to wonder if she was ever going to stop blushing. "Even if you're right, Olaf, is it really-" She lowered her voice a bit. "I mean, is it that obvious?"

The snowman didn't have a chance to answer. Elsa got there first, hugging Anna tight. "I think Olaf has a gift for understanding us, Anna." For a moment, Anna almost lost herself in the sheer happiness of it, almost missing Elsa's words. No matter how much time she spent with Elsa, it wasn't getting any less intense.

"Yeah, I do!" Olaf suddenly jumped to his feet. "Hey! If Kristoff's here then so's Sven!" He gave Anna and Elsa a quick hug and dashed for the door. "I better find a carrot so he doesn't eat my nose again!" And then he was gone- well, almost. His enthusiasm was so great that he closed the door on his own hand. "Oops!" He grabbed the stick out of the door and ran off. They could hear him calling down the hallway, "Sven!"

Anna stared after him for a moment, smiling, then turned her attention back to Elsa. But Elsa, to her surprise, had let go of her, and was walking towards the nearest window. A little shiver went through her. "Elsa? Are you okay?"

Reaching the window, Elsa peered out into the courtyard. Even that small hesitation sent another chill down Anna's spine. She turned back to Anna, and she was smiling. "Of course I'm alright, Anna. You're here." Her tone shifted a little, becoming less certain. "I just wish we knew more about your powers. I'm sure they're real. Maybe it would tell us more about mine, too."

For no reason she could name, Anna felt a spark of annoyance at her sister. It was the same as when Elsa had snubbed Hans at the coronation ball, only this time there was nothing behind it, just an irrational unwillingness to discuss her supposed magic. "Isn't it bad enough that everyone told you to be afraid of hurting me, Elsa? I don't want to be afraid of hurting you too!"

Elsa flinched, just a little, at Anna's tone. "It was a mistake, Anna. Father just misunderstood. No one knew that being together was the right answer for us. And you haven't hurt me. You wouldn't, I know that."

It was hard for Anna to actually listen to what Elsa was saying. Seeing Elsa flinch had made the anger rise further. Just _moments_ ago she'd been wondering at how much she loved her sister, and now this. She tried to keep her voice calm. "Elsa... I don't want to think about all these things, not magic or Hans and his stupid name-calling or all the mistakes our parents made. I just want to _be_ together again! Forget everything else! You're here, I'm here, can't we just be happy with that?"

Anna could see Elsa trying to smile. She could see the frustration in her voice making Elsa want to cringe. She realized now that Hans had really dug in deep, upset her so badly that not all Elsa's love and caring was pushing it away. She desperately forced herself to listen, as a buzzing fury threatened to white out Elsa's reply. "If you think that's best." Elsa reached for Anna's hand, but _hesitated_, and the hesitation sent a snap of rage through Anna. How dare Hans do this to her, make her so angry that it made Elsa afraid! When Elsa did finish reaching out anyway, took her hand, Anna just barely managed to shove the feelings back again.

Elsa was still talking. "But I think we should find out what's really going on. Anna, you're glowing..."

Anna looked down at herself. Sure enough, her skin was glowing a dull red, almost like the embers of a fire. She looked back up at Elsa abruptly, and the worry in Elsa's eyes sent a shock of fresh frustration through her. She didn't want Elsa to worry. She didn't want to hurt Elsa! A burst of light blinded her.

When her vision cleared, she found herself sitting on the floor, several feet back from where she'd been standing. There was smoke rising from the floor in that spot, and just in front of that, a wall of ice about the size of Elsa. She looked at her hands, and there was no more glow. The anger was largely gone too, overtaken completely by raw confusion. "E-Elsa?"

A terrifying instant went by, then Elsa peered out from behind the ice wall. "Anna! Are you okay?" The ice dissolved into blue light as Elsa rushed to Anna's side.

She shook her head, feeling dazed. "I'm n-not sure. I don't know what... what just happened?" Her whole body ached, as if she'd just climbed the north mountain all over again. There were spots across her eyes, like she'd looked right at the sun, and the edge of her dress looked singed. There were tiny wisps of smoke coming from her hands too. What had she done?

Elsa's voice wasn't calm, or even gently uncertain, anymore. She just sounded scared. "I'm not sure... I think you made fire... I made the wall when I saw that light, it was instinct." Elsa reached for Anna's arm, but recoiled instantly at the touch. "Your skin's burning!"

_Burning?_ Anna barely even felt warm. It was Elsa's touch that was very cold. "Maybe you're right about finding out more, Elsa." Had she almost _burned_ Elsa? She could barely breathe, all the anger replaced by something near panic. Was _this_ how Elsa had felt all those years? _No wonder she closed her door..._


	22. Desire

Elsa looked back at Anna. Her sister was bundled up in a thick winter coat, but continued to shiver as if they were atop a mountain, not in the deep of the wood in summer. She was sure Anna's power was responsible, but had no advice to offer. Her own magic protected her from any cold, but it had never left her unable to tolerate heat. Yet Anna looked as though she might turn to ice all over again.

Worry ate at Elsa. As much as she tried to smile for Anna's sake, in truth she was terrified. It was bad enough that Anna had no answers, that she was upset enough at the idea that she might hurt Elsa that she now shied away from her sister's touch. But when Anna had tried to stand up after that blast of fire, and realized she _couldn't_, Elsa had found herself only just barely holding on to her composure. At least Anna hadn't made any argument when Elsa suggested visiting Kristoff's family for help. Kristoff himself had been harder to convince.

* * *

"You want me to _what_?" Kristoff couldn't believe his ears.

"I want you to take us to the rock trolls for help, Kristoff. They know more about magic than any of us."

He could tell Elsa was trying to sound firm and commanding, but it wasn't much of an effort. It was way too obvious she was upset. He didn't really feel a lot better, with Anna over there slumped against the wall like that. He looked at her, frowning, then back at Elsa. She didn't even _look_ queenly anymore, hugging Anna all desperately like that. "Everything Grandpabbie's said about your magic just made things worse! He told your dad to be scared, he told Anna to go find Hans, do you really want his advice again?!"

"I don't know where else to turn!" Hearing the note of panic in her voice, Kristoff was instantly sorry for confronting her. She was just worried about Anna. He got that. He was worried too!

"Okay, okay, take it easy! I want to help Anna too!" Why had he even hesitated? Was it something that stupid Hans had said? _Wow, am I jealous of her?_ What a weird idea. "Aren't you the queen, though? I can take her myself, you don't have to come."

He hadn't known Elsa very long, but he was _sure_ she wasn't an angry person. So when she glared angrily at him, he actually took a step back. It looked like an expression that belonged more on Anna. "No! You're taking us both! Right now!"

* * *

Now, sitting on Sven, Anna huddled right behind her as Kristoff led them all through the wood, Elsa had a moment to wonder if maybe he'd been right to object. Through a haze of fear, she did remember the first time she'd met Grandpabbie, when he'd erased Anna's memories of her magic. What if his solution now was the same, to keep Anna from remembering powers of her own? What else would he have to erase to do that? There wasn't a single moment of the last two days that Elsa was willing to lose, not even this.

She shook her head, reminding herself again that this journey was the only option she had. The only other person who seemed to know _anything_ about magic was Hans, and she didn't dare trust him.

She looked back at Anna again, reaching back to take her sister's hand before remembering at the last moment that her touch had only made things worse. After all those years, she should have been used to not being able to hug Anna, but too much had gone between them in the short time they'd been together again. She couldn't bear it at all now. She longed terribly to feel Anna's arms around her.

Then there was Kristoff. _He_ could still touch Anna. He'd lifted her right onto Sven's back with no trouble. And for some reason, Elsa didn't like that at all. All her focus on getting help for Anna (_again!_), she'd still had time to notice that she didn't want anyone but herself getting near her sister.

It was silly. She had every reason to trust Kristoff, including Anna's word. There was no reason at all to mind anything he did. But she kept remembering Anna's hugs, Anna's kisses, Anna's _passion_. That was for her, not for Kristoff!

"Elsa?" Elsa spun around to look at Anna. Her sister was trying to smile at her. Though the result was fairly awful, Elsa wouldn't have traded it for anything. "Stop worrying, I'm gonna be fine."

She wanted to cry. Anna was still worried about _her_ in the middle of all this. And despite herself, she did feel a little better. She managed a little nod.

* * *

_"Are you sure you don't feel just a little bad? I bet they'd forgive you!"_

Amusing. Opportunity had shown itself. He'd taken it. Just as he was doing now.

_"I think everyone just needs lots of hugs!"_

Weak-minded nonsense. He would never let such meaningless things divert him from his due.

_"Aren't you lonely?"_

How laughable. The solitude to make his plans, to win what should have been his always, was a blessing.

Still, the naïveté of the poor creature had served him well. He would never have a better chance.

* * *

Sven stepped slowly into an empty clearing. "We're here," Kristoff declared, looking around. "Where _is_ everyone?" Elsa followed his gaze. Sure enough, there wasn't so much as a rock in sight, much less a rock troll. Kristoff was already calling out. "Hey, guys! Need a little help, here!"

Several silent moments passed, then a single rock rolled into view, coming from the same path they'd just walked down. Pausing in front of Sven, the rock unrolled itself into the aged form Elsa recognized as Grandpabbie. "Yes, I would say that you do." He bowed to them.

At any other time, Elsa might have been fascinated to see the troll again, but right now all she could think about was Anna. "Can you help her?"

He shook his head slowly. "The heart is not so easily changed." He looked thoughtfully at Anna. "But your heart is not frozen. There is fire in it."

"Yes!" Elsa pushed herself off Sven's back. "She got angry, and then there was fire, and now she's like this."

Grandpabbie made a sweeping gesture in the air. Two shadowy silhouettes, one ice-blue, one fire-red, formed before them, made from a soft light. Elsa recognized one of them as herself. She'd seen it before, when was here as a child. The figures were holding hands; the second _had_ to be Anna. Grandpabbie's voice was slow, calm. "Your magic has grown strong. Now it has awakened hers." The figures spun around one another. "As fear has been your enemy, Your Majesty, so is it your sister's."

The second figure crumpled, the red fading towards purple, towards blue. Elsa stepped back, towards Anna, as Grandpabbie looked to the shivering girl. "You must not hide what is in your heart, or else..." He didn't complete the sentence, but rather looked towards the images he had conjured. The second figure lay blue and motionless, the first bent over the second as if crying. "But as an act of true love will melt a frozen heart, so will carrying love with you show you great wonders." The figures straightened, standing together and holding hands once more. A few seconds went by, then the entire vision misted away in wisps of light.

Grandpabbie stepped towards Anna, and reached up to take her hand. "I can not put the fire into your heart. You must find it for yourself. You know where it lies." He glanced towards Elsa, then walked over to Kristoff. "It is good to see you, my boy. It is well that you are here to look after them." Without further ado, he curled back into rock form and rolled away.

They all stared after him. Kristoff yelled after the retreating rock, "I'm just here for Anna, you know!" Sven immediately gave him a solid head-butt. "Oof! I mean yeah, sure, look after them! C'mon, Sven, give me a break!"

Anna laughed weakly, slowly pushing herself off Sven's back as Elsa had done. Slumped against the reindeer's side, she reached out for her sister. "Elsa, he said fear was the enemy. I'm not afraid of hurting you, but I am afraid of losing you."

As she had before, Elsa hesitated. She would give anything to not lose Anna, anything but letting Anna get hurt. She could feel frost forming under her feet, see snowflakes falling in the air around her. _But she's right... if fear is the enemy, if love is really the answer for her, for us, like it was for me, then holding back is what hurts her!_ She reached out as well, grabbed Anna's hand.

A shock went through her at the contact, but she held on. She watched in awe as Anna's whole body came alive with fire, a brilliant yellow-white glow surrounding and running through her. Elsa felt the heat of it, but it didn't burn or even discomfit her. It was like sunlight. There was something happening to her own body too, but she didn't want to take her eyes off Anna long enough to look. It felt like she might be glowing too. A wind began to rise, a swirling column around them made visible by the snowflakes and sparks of fire mixed within it.

Then it all went away. Wind, glow, warmth, gone in a heartbeat. There was just Anna, still standing there, still holding her hand. She looked as healthy as she ever had, and no less awed than Elsa. They stared at each other for several long moments. Elsa could have lost herself in just looking into Anna's eyes.

Finally, Anna spoke up. "I guess you're the only one who gets a magic dress, huh!" She jumped forward, pouncing Elsa and wrapping her in the warmest, happiest hug Elsa had ever known. If her own heart had ever frozen, that alone would have melted it. _This_, this was what she wanted more than anything, to be in Anna's arms.

Distantly, she heard Kristoff muttering to himself. "Phooey, so she made some lights. Bet I could do that." Then, a loud, "Ow! Sven!"

She would have giggled, but she was too busy nuzzling at Anna, trying to make up all at once for the last hour of no contact. When Anna kissed her, she responded fervently, pressing up against her sister with all her strength. She knew then that Anna understood, that this was what she had wanted too.

* * *

It had all been almost too easy. Trick that pitiful snowman, pretend repentance to the servants, let them believe that their precious Queen Elsa had ordered his shackles removed. Such trusting fools. That was what came of serving such a weak ruler. Those girls were nothing, _nothing_ compared to him.

_Are they?_ A tiny voice in the back of his head whispered to him. _Are they nothing? They bested you. Just like your brothers. How do you know it's not you who is nothing?_

No! The right to rule, to power, was his by birth! No overgrown child with a little snow, or her mindless, if amusing, sister, was going to stand between him and what he'd been denied.

_"A little snow?" The whole fjord frozen, a kingdom plunged into deep winter, creations of ice and frost brought to life, and you dismiss her so easily? And the other had enough will to choose to die for her. Aren't you the one who has things to learn?_

"NO!" He stopped, looking around to see if anyone had seen him bellowing at nothing. Fortunately, none had. No, he wasn't going to play servant to such lesser minds. It wouldn't be so hard to remove them. Unleash the younger's twisted lust, and let that do as it would to the elder. Even if harmless, it would distract them for more than long enough.

_"An act of true love" melted her frozen heart, but you think you can trick her with lust? You grasp at straws. _You_ are the lesser mind. You failed at home, and you failed here, and you'll fail again. Submit yourself to them, and they can help you._

"I will _NOT_ be their plaything!" Praying that his outburst had gone unheard a second time, he quickly walked on. He was talking to himself again. Stupid. Rage built within him. How dare they weaken his mind this way with their games? He would show them no mercy.


	23. Fury

Fury

Anna idly nuzzled at Elsa as they rode back towards the castle. At first they'd walked together on foot, holding hands, but Elsa had tired easily on the forest paths. Anna had worried that there was something wrong with her sister, until Kristoff had pointed out that it was well after sunset. She'd barely noticed, with all the power running through her. She could tell that the sky was dark, but it was as if there was light within her eyes; she could see as clearly as if it were day. Sitting on Sven's back with Elsa curled up against her, she resisted the urge to find out what more she could do. It could wait. And then there was Kristoff's mood. Ever since Grandpabbie had rolled away, Kristoff had been in a foul humor. Anna hadn't known him long enough to figure out just what was on his mind, but she was afraid to ask.

In the end, she didn't have to. Kristoff slowed his pace until Sven passed him, until he was walking right next to her. "So what was all _that_ about anyway?"

She didn't know quite how to answer that. "Um, what do you mean?"

"All that! All those pictures and things about fire and love and then there was this whole whirlwind and you turned all glowy yellow and Elsa was really bright blue! What _was_ that?!" For some reason, he sounded pretty upset about it.

"Kristoff, what's wrong?" She took an arm away from holding Elsa to reach over and grab his hand. "It's not like you to be so angry."

He looked at her with a surprised expression, then sighed when Sven grunted at him. "Alright, look. Hans said some pretty strange things about you, and I'm kinda wondering if he was right."

She frowned. What Hans had said to her and Elsa was bad enough. What had he said to Kristoff to bother him so much? It'd really seemed like Kristoff at least understood her some! "Like what?"

"Well, he said... He said you love Elsa, like _really_ love, and that I meant nohing to you. He said no one but Elsa means anything to you and that you were the one in control, or something like that... Look, I know it sounds completely crazy!" He was turning red just from saying it.

Anna felt anger starting to boil inside her. How dare Hans say anything of the kind! "You can't possibly think you mean nothing to me!"

He reached over and grabbed Sven by the antlers, bringing the reindeer to an abrupt halt. Anna had to hold tight to keep from being thrown right off Sven's back. She was relieved when Elsa didn't wake, but it was instantly lost in frustration as Kristoff glared at her. "What am I supposed to think, Anna? You kissed me and then you ran off and I've barely seen you! You're spending all your time with Elsa and then Olaf starts saying you were kissing _her_ and now you're doing magic and all you or Elsa would tell me on the way here was that we needed to come! And now Grandpabbie says I'm here to look after you two?"

She pushed his hand away, glaring right back. "I haven't gotten to spend time with Elsa for most of my life! I'm sorry if I'm worried more about her than someone I met yesterday! And whose business is it of yours who I kiss anyway?!"

She was instantly sorry for the outburst, seeing the hurt on Kristoff's face. "Kristoff, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that. Please, try to understand, I'm still figuring all this out. I don't know what's happening either. I just know Elsa's mine and I need her." Anna paused, blinking. _Did I just say that?_ "I mean, she's my sister."

Kristoff frowned at her. "I think you meant it the first way. And I really do believe you don't know what that means. I sure don't. Do whatever you want, Anna. Sven, make sure they get back safe, okay?" He turned around and stormed back towards the clearing they'd left behind, ignoring both Sven's protesting snort and Anna calling after him.

Anna stared after him for a moment, then turned to find herself looking straight into Sven's face. She wished she had some idea what Kristoff was thinking. It hurt to see her friend so upset, and not knowing herself what it all meant only made it worse. She reached over to pat Sven's head. "Sven, what do I do?"

The reindeer just nuzzled her hand before turning his head forward and starting towards the castle again. Anna sighed. If only Sven could talk.

* * *

As Sven approached the castle gate, Anna gently nudged Elsa. "Elsa, wake up, we're home." Elsa shifted, yawned. She opened her eyes and smiled at Anna, then immediately shut them again, snuggling up to her sister and laying her head on Anna's shoulder. Every bit of it made her heart sing. And Anna really, _really_ wanted to just let her stay there.

But she knew what Elsa herself would say if she were more awake. She poked Elsa's nose. "Come on, Elsa, you're not being very queenly." At least she'd gotten a few extra minutes, with the streets so empty late at night.

"That won't be a problem for either of you any longer." The all too familiar voice came from right in front of them. Anna looked up from her sister and saw Hans standing there, blade unsheathed and pointed at Sven's nose. Several guards were arrayed behind him. Most wore uncertain expressions, but some were grinning as widely as Hans himself.

Now Elsa was wide awake. She pulled away from Anna and climbed down from Sven's back to face Hans. "How dare you? Who let you out of the dungeon?" She swept her gaze across the guards, several of whom simply turned and ran. Anna would have been impressed, but she was too busy being angry. She shoved herself off Sven's back and came up beside Elsa, wishing that she could look half so regal on an instant's notice.

Hans laughed in Elsa's face. "The snowman, of course." He adopted a look of absolute contrition. "'You believe me, don't you, Olaf? I never meant to hurt Anna. It was all a misunderstanding! I just want to help her and Elsa!'" He laughed harshly. "Almost too easy."

Anna seethed. How _dare_ he use her against Olaf like that! "And what makes you think Elsa isn't gonna just freeze you solid right now, huh?!"

"This." He reached over and grabbed Anna's wrist, yanking her forward and spinning her so her back was to him, the sword held to her throat. The move caught her completely off guard; she had no chance to struggle at all. "Go ahead, witch, use your ice. She'll freeze with me."

She was horrified to see Elsa hesitate. She _knew_ Elsa could aim well enough to knock Hans away, but if she was afraid of hurting her sister, she wouldn't dare try. "Elsa, just do it! If you freeze me you can just melt it afterwards!"

Elsa backed away a step. "Hans, let her go!"

"'Let her go'?" He started laughing again. "Pathetic. Without your keeper, you're nothing. You pretend at being Queen, but all you are is a frightened child playing make-believe. Waiting for your dear sister to mother you, because no one else will, and she too lost in her own games to ever unlock her potential." He looked at Anna. "Such a shame. You could have been so much more."

While Anna barely understood half of what Hans was saying, his spiteful tone was enough to set her mind ablaze. How _dare_ he talk to Elsa like that? She grabbed at his arm, tried to pry it away, but he pressed the sword hard into the flesh of her neck, and she had to stop. "Elsa, freeze him!" She was so angry that she was shouting at Elsa too. "Stop being afraid of yourself and do something!"

She could tell Elsa was trying, but the fear was too much for her. Frost formed all around, a wind was picking up, snow was falling, but none of it touched Hans. "I can't..." She fell to her knees. "Anna, he'll kill you..."

Fury raged in Anna's chest. It was bad enough to have to listen to Hans' spite, but seeing Elsa so easily broken, defeated, was more than she could take. Without quite realizing what she was doing, she grabbed hold of the blade against her neck, and it _melted_ in her hand. Wrenching herself free of Hans' grip, she spun around and hit him with- with _something_. The Prince flew back several feet, landing on his back and sliding a couple feet more before stopping.

The snow in the air was melting before it reached the ground, and the frost that had begun to form was turning back to water. There was light, and Anna was distantly aware that it was coming from her. Hans slowly sat up, shaking his head. Anna stormed towards him, and he cowered from the sight of her. She grabbed him by his lapels and lifted him until she was looking at him from only inches away. "You're not going near Elsa again. Ever!" She shoved him away, practically tossing him towards the remaining guards. She couldn't believe how easy it was. Her whole body was bursting with power. "Take him back to the dungeon, and this time _keep_ him there!" A burst of fire struck the ground near the guards' feet. "Right now!"

The clearly terrified guards practically tripped over each other to rush forward and grab Hans. They dragged him away as quickly as they could, giving him just enough time to look back at Anna, his face full of shock, and say, "You can't do that! How did you find it? You're too weak! How? How did you? How!" He kept shouting at her until he was too far away to be heard.

All the energy went out of Anna's body then, and she fell to the ground, gasping for breath. In an instant, Elsa was at her side, Sven right behind her. "Anna? Are you okay? Anna!"

She really wasn't sure. She felt like she'd just run all around the castle a hundred times. "I think so... I guess Grandpabbie was right about the fire, huh?" The whole thing felt like a dream. For a moment, she'd had hold of so much power, she was sure she could have done anything. Hans had just made her so angry! Did Elsa feel like that when she used her magic?

"Anna, that was amazing! You started glowing, and Hans' sword just melted, and you were throwing fire!" Elsa hugged her desperately tight, her body freezing cold against Anna's, but not intolerably so.

Anna returned Elsa's hug, still catching her breath. "I guess we should have a little talk with Olaf."


	24. Vision

_No! It's not possible! How did she do it? Such power! How can she have such power?!_

The thoughts haunted him all the way back to the dungeon. He barely noticed when the guards hurled him onto the bunk and slammed the door behind him, despite the pain in his chest. Confusion warred with rage. He'd had it! He'd won! The so-called queen would never have risked her precious sister! How did Anna keep beating him?

_Fool!_ Laughter echoed in his skull. _You still choose not to understand their bond! You can't split them, you can't defeat them together, and you're too pathetic to bend knee and let them hand you of their own will what you crave to take by force!_

Bend knee to those _children_? Madness!

_No! Cunning! Your brothers are not here. There is no one to taunt you! These girls, they _are_ children, but they will not judge you for what you think of yourself, only for what you do. Help them, and they will make you more than you could ever take from them!_

Help them? Give them even more power? Why should he be subservient? They were the ones who needed him. They were the ones who couldn't even help themselves. True love. Nonsense. Nothing but the gleam of desire in Anna's eye, the lure of Elsa's power. Of course he could split them. This new magic only made it more certain. Let the fire melt the ice. Passion to destroy innocence.

_This again? Are you so weak that such cruel fantasies are your only recourse? Let them show you the truth. Let yourself see what _you_ can make of fire and ice together, show them what they can become! You need not destroy anything. Join them, take the hand of friendship they offer. Be the herald of their power. Be the envy of the world, have all that you ever desired at your fingertips, and all you need do to earn it is choose to!_

He seethed. "I don't need their truths or their help! I don't need anybody!"

"Everyone needs friends! Why don't you want any?"

Hans nearly leapt out of his skin, momentarily convinced that the maddening thoughts had become manifest, before recognizing the voice as that of the snowman. He spun to face Olaf, who was standing just outside the bars and smiling as happily as ever. A window at the far end of the hallway lit the creature from behind, making him seem to glow. "You! Why do you haunt me? What does it matter to you? Go back to your mistress!"

Olaf pondered that for a few moments. "Do you really not like Anna?"

He made a grab for the snowman through the bars, but his chest still ached where Anna's fire had hit him, and he was too slow. "Leaving her to die and threatening to kill her to get Elsa's cooperation wasn't enough proof for you?"

Olaf shook his head, scattering snow from the little cloud over his head all about. The light behind him refracted in a thousand directions. "Nah." He peered at Hans. "I don't think you're a mean person at all. You seem really sad inside, that's why you should be friends with them! They wanna be nice to you, I know it!"

Hans paused to peer at Olaf more closely. There was such _sincerity_ in the snowman's words. "You really believe that, don't you? That they'd forgive base cruelty, attempted murder, high treason, all of it. Don't you understand, you poor creature? I used them, just like I used you."

The snowman made quite a little show of pondering that too, even stroking his chin with his little wooden hand. "Well, sure, if you said you were sorry. I guess maybe Anna'd make you say it more times than Elsa would." He grinned cheerfully again.

The expression was like nails on the chalkboard of Hans' thoughts. "Why? Why would they? You're made from a moment of blind hope, of course you see everything as foolishly happy. But they wouldn't trust me." He smirked. "I wouldn't trust me. I'll be no one's pawn, snowman, make no mistake of that."

Olaf blinked at him, obviously confused. "But no one wants you to be obedient or something! They just wanna be friends, like me!"

"You?" He let his disdain show clearly. "I didn't ask for your friendship, you strange little thing."

"Too late! You're my friend and friends forgive each other, so there!" The snowman laughed, clearly confident in his cheerful declaration.

Hans stepped away from the bars, taken aback. This- this _apparition_ of light and childish wonder, it wouldn't hear reason. _How could anyone, anything, look at me, and not see the monster I knew I am?_

The voice that answered was beginning to sound uncomfortably like Olaf's. _The monster you fear you are. Isn't that what you said to Elsa? You didn't have to save her life on the mountain. You didn't have to bring her back to the castle, or show her such compassion when you both thought Anna was dead. You didn't have to smile at Anna when she couldn't see. You even tried to spare Anna the deeper betrayal by admitting the truth instead of pretending to kiss her. Was it really just a "mistake" that you left before making sure she was gone, knowing how far she'd already pushed herself? Did you think Elsa wished to live, thinking she'd killed her sister? And just now, did you _really_ believe you were doing anything other than calling out Anna's power? You are not such the fool! You would condemn yourself for ambition and all these moments of kindness, and mercy? Some monster, Prince Hans._

* * *

Elsa walked with Anna into the castle, trying not to worry at her sister's exhaustion. It made sense, it really did; her power could tire her too. Still, seeing Anna stumble upset her. "Anna, are you sure you're okay?"

"Of course I'm okay, I guess throwing fire around just really takes it out of you!" Anna laughed, instantly warming Elsa's heart. "But I sure wasn't gonna let him just mess with you like that!"

She became aware that snow was starting to swirl about them as she took Anna's hand. "I feel so silly now. You were right, it would've been so easy to stop him without hurting you."

Anna smiled. "You just don't like listening to me when I tell you I'm safe with you, Elsa."

The tone was gentle, teasing, but Elsa saw sparks of firelight flitting about between the snowflakes. Was Anna angry inside? A little thrill of fear went through her, and the room got quite a bit colder all at once. It wasn't Anna she was afraid of, but she knew all too well what it meant not to have control of her power. She didn't want Anna to have to feel like that. "Anna, you weren't safe with me when I didn't know how to control my powers. I still can't control them without your help!"

"So what? I don't know what I'm doing with magic at all, but you aren't afraid of me!" Anna's smile was starting to droop. "Elsa, please don't do this, don't make me face this alone too." The room was getting warmer again, the brilliant fire-yellow sparks beginning to outshine their own refractions through the swirling snow.

The whirlwind around them was a perfect mirror for the turmoil of Elsa's feelings. The one thing she was sure she couldn't bear was to push Anna away again. And Anna was right, she wasn't afraid of her one bit! She just didn't want Anna to be either! Swaths of pure blue light mixed with the snow, power so raw, so intense, it wouldn't even form into ice. "I wouldn't! I couldn't! Anna, I need you!"

She had a moment to wonder as the snow and fire grew stronger about them, to be curious if Anna's power was as amazing as her own. Then she felt Anna's arms around her, holding her tight, and even the magic didn't matter anymore.

* * *

When she came back to herself, Elsa found she was nestled snugly in Anna's lap. Anna was asleep, laying on a sofa in the entry hall, with Elsa held rather tightly to her. It could have been thirty seconds later, it could have been hours, she couldn't tell and didn't really care. She wasn't inclined to move either. She felt safe and calm here, and Anna's body was comfortingly warm next to her.

Elsa would have giggled, if she wasn't afraid of waking her sister. Usually it was impossible to keep Anna so still, even in her sleep. She'd always been restless, full of energy. _I guess letting out all that fire actually used it up._ She nuzzled at Anna and snuggled closer, intending to nap alongside her.

"How precious," said Hans' familiar voice.

Elsa's eyes shot open. She stared in shock at Hans. He was standing in the doorway, unarmed but also unguarded, only Olaf beside him. Frost began to form on the sofa, but she forced her power back, Anna's closeness giving her control. "Olaf, we need to have a talk about opening the dungeon doors." She looked at Hans. "Is this to be another choice between my crown or my sister's life, Prince Hans?" She felt faintly proud of herself for maintaining a calm, even queenly tone despite the slight absurdity of doing so in her present position.

"No." To her surprise, he took a position of bent knee. "Your snowy creation wants me to believe you'll welcome me if I present myself as a-" He hesitated an instant. "As a friend." Olaf nodded eagerly, but didn't get a chance to say anything before Hans went on. "I tire of games of sword and magic, Queen Elsa. I can't best either of you. So I throw myself on your mercy."

She carefully unwound Anna's arms from around her so she could sit up, leaving a hand on Anna's so she wouldn't think Elsa was gone and awaken. "Trust isn't easily earned, Hans." She took a deep breath. If Hans was telling the truth, if he really did want to be who Anna'd thought he was, then turning him away would be foolish. He _could_ help them, she was sure of that, even if Anna wouldn't easily believe it. And it would be a lot better than just keeping him in the dungeon trying to figure out what to do with him, letting him distract from everything she and Anna were finding out together.

But if it was just another trick, who knew what he might do? Trying to imagine the possibilities hurt her head. He'd already tried to kill her _and_ Anna, most recently just hours ago! The idea of letting him loose to try again scared her badly. Could even Olaf have said something so convincing that it'd changed that kind of mind so quickly? She wished she could ask Anna. But she knew that Anna wouldn't even think about it with Hans standing right there. She'd react instinctively to protect Elsa and that wouldn't solve anything.

She another breath, let it out, getting to her feet. She tried to step towards Hans, but Anna was asleep on the entire trailing part of her dress and she didn't think she could keep the concentration to dissolve and reform it without revealing more than she cared to. "I have no wish to keep you locked away. But I can't just set aside your actions before now. If I am a... a 'frightened child playing make-believe', then yes, you and what you've done frighten me."

He smiled at her. There was no smirk in it; it reminded her of seeing him with Anna at the coronation dance. She could almost have given someone like _that_ a chance, it was Anna who'd been acting rashly. "What I said was that you're lost without your k-" He cut himself off. "I mean, your sister. You know she wouldn't let me hurt you, Queen Elsa. I can't defend myself from her, and I'd rather try to earn your trust than return home."

She frowned. "I thought they were the ones who sent you back."

He frowned right back at her. "I lied. I came back on my own. Even your dungeon is better than my brothers and their taunts. I doubt you can understand that." He gestured at Anna's sleeping form.

Something about his tone struck her as familiar. She leaned in slightly towards him. "Hans, did they fear you?"

Olaf had to jump out of the way as Hans made a sweeping, angry gesture. "They envied me! I was the smartest, the most cunning! That was why they always pushed me aside! Even my father-!" He choked on fury, reminding her in some distant, strange way of Anna.

She pulled herself away from the sofa, letting the trail of her dress simply melt away, and knelt down to face him eye to eye. "I do understand. My parents feared my powers, and I always believed Anna and everyone else would too." She took his hand, smiling in answer to his astonished look. "It's not like that everywhere, Hans." Her smile turned a little wry. "If you stop trying to kill us both at every turn, you'll be welcome here." A small giggle. "Just maybe not as Anna's husband."

He gave her his most winning smile. "I would never think to take the honor of your sister's hand from you."

She blushed a deep red, a wash of snow blowing through the room. "O-Olaf, find Kai and tell him I said to give Prince Hans a room. One with guards." She gave Hans an apologetic look. "You don't have to stay in the dungeon, but I can't just forget everything you've done." A smaller smile. "Anna will be upset enough as it is." She glanced at Olaf again. "And Olaf, don't let him out without the guards this time, okay?"

"No need to explain. Thank you, Queen Elsa." He followed a cheerfully whistling Olaf out of the room.

Elsa closed the door behind them, letting out a gasp of air and turning to look at Anna. To her relief, her sister was still asleep on the sofa. She wondered how she was going to explain this. _She's gonna think I fell for his charm just like she did..._ She winced. _Maybe I did._ But she couldn't just ignore a plea like that. He'd told her not to be the monster others feared she was. She had to give him the chance to do the same for himself. Anna would understand that, wouldn't she?

She laid down beside Anna again, nestling back into her sister's arms, and closed her eyes. Hans' teasing (_was he teasing?_) aside, this was where she wanted to be.


	25. Wonder

Anna shook her head a little. _Wow, I was really tired!_ Where had she fallen asleep, anyway? The last thing she remembered was sparks of fire lighting up Elsa from behind, and then the gentle chill of Elsa's skin against hers.

Come to think of it, she could still feel it now. She opened her eyes to find she had Elsa snuggled up to her on a sofa in the castle's entry hall. _How come we keep sleeping when the other's awake, anyway?_ Not that she was complaining, really. She didn't exactly _mind_ having her sister to snuggle, after years of nothing but fleeting glimpses from a distance.

Still, this sofa was a little small for the two of them, and she was still wearing what was now a day-old dress. She didn't have a magical ice gown like Elsa! _Does she have to keep making that thing over and over, or does it just kinda stay clean or something? Come to think of it, is she just gonna keep wearing that forever?_ As beautiful as Elsa was in the dress, bare shoulders didn't really strike Anna as very queenly.

She sat up slowly, keeping Elsa held tight to her with one arm, and rubbed her face with her free hand. She knew her hair had to be a mess, but she could fix that as soon as she got her hands on a hairbrush. _I'll just grab one from my room. It's not like I'm gonna stay there much when I can just sleep with Elsa!_ The thought made her giggle a little. Even as children in the same room, they'd had separate beds, though she very clearly remembered making quite a habit of pouncing Elsa in the middle of the night.

Standing up carrying Elsa was almost too easy. When she'd been running around the castle with Elsa before, her sister's weight had at least been noticeable. Now, she might as well have been lifting a basket of apples. It had to be related to the magic somehow. _Guess strength is one of my powers, or something!_ She paused, pondering that. _Hey, can I make dresses too?_ She had no idea what her powers could do at all. She hadn't had a whole bunch of years to mess with magic like Elsa had!

Her curiosity was too much for her. She carefully set Elsa back down on the sofa, making sure to lay her in the warm spot they'd occupied a moment before so maybe she wouldn't notice right away that Anna wasn't there anymore. Elsa made a small "mm" sound, and snuggled herself around a sofa cushion, but to Anna's relief, didn't wake up.

She took a deep breath, holding her hands out in front of her, palms up. "So how does this work anyway?" The room offered her no answer, of course, but she hadn't expected one. All the magic she'd done so far was instinctive, without any thought behind it. She'd just kept getting angry. Or like before she'd fallen asleep, when thinking about Elsa had gotten so intense. She'd seen Elsa summon up ice just by thinking about it, but there'd always been some kind of feeling behind that too, at least as far as she could tell. So maybe she had to be feeling something for it to work!

She closed her eyes, concentrating. At first, nothing happened. Then something rose up within her body, and she felt something burst free from her fingertips. Her eyes shot open, and she was amazed to see the last of a bolt of red light, shot through with the same brilliant white sparkles that came with the blue of Elsa's magic, _splash_ against the far wall, leaving a tiny scorch mark.

"Wow!" She just barely managed to contain herself to a whisper. She wasn't dreaming or imagining things, it wasn't just some way she'd borrowed Elsa's magic, it was _real_! She laughed and laughed and laughed, running about the room, tiny little bolts of red flying from her hands in every direction except Elsa's. Wary of waking her sister, she ran through the door and down the hallway, face flushed with delight, dancing about in circles and feeling energy flowing through her body. It was _amazing_, it felt almost as good as being with Elsa! Did Elsa feel like this when she used her powers? How could anyone ever have been afraid of this!

Anna wandered all around the castle, laughing, spinning, skipping, dancing about. She felt so good, she burst into song. Her body began to trail yellow firelight, leaving sparks behind her. She peeked into empty rooms, startled servants as she ran by, barely paused long enough to wave at a confused but delighted Olaf as she went by him, and jumped right out one of the windows onto the roof, running across the whole length of the castle again and jumping right back in through another window. She slid down the bannister of a circular spiral of stairs, still trailing energy all about. Landing on her feet, she just kept running, laughing with sheer happiness. She couldn't _wait_ to show Elsa!

* * *

All at once, her carefree running about was interrupted. She found herself on the floor, slightly dazed. A few instants passed before she realized she'd run into something. Rubbing her head, she looked up, and was shocked to see _Hans_ standing over her, offering his hand. She felt an intense moment of déjà vu; his smile, his posture, his gesture, even his clothing, matched perfectly with when she'd first met him at the docks. The residual glow of power within her, and the delight that'd come with it, even dispelled for just a second her anger and mistrust, and she was struck all over again by his gallant, handsome face.

The feeling passed quickly. She shoved his hand away, barely noticing that her every motion was still trailing firelight, scrambling to her feet on her own. "What are you doing here! You're supposed to be in the dungeon!" She felt like crying. She'd been so happy only moments before. Why did he keep messing up her life!

"Your sister has a way of speaking to the heart, Princess." Hans straightened, looking her up and down with a rather mixed expression. "I can't lay hand on her while you protect her, and I can hardly remove you with her around. I can't go home, even if I wanted to. My options are to sit in your dungeon or be moved by Queen Elsa's kindness."

"You can't possibly think I'd trust you just like that! You were ready to cut my head off like an hour ago!" She tried to keep her temper, but there was no holding it back. "You tried to kill Elsa! You left me to freeze to death! You insult us every chance you get and I don't even understand half of what you're talking about except that I know I shouldn't like it! You let me think I loved you when you knew I was just being stupid!" Anna felt tears rolling down her cheeks, and dashed them angrily away, ashamed to cry in front of him. "I- I- I don't even know what you are! Elsa can't speak to your heart, she couldn't even freeze it! You don't have one!"

He waited, unmoved, until she ran out of words. "I don't think you trust me, Anna. I don't think you should, either. I certainly wouldn't." He walked to a nearby chair, sat down. Only then did Anna belatedly realize that they were in a guest room; in her dancing about, she'd lost all track of where she was going. He set his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands under his chin. "I've wondered if I was on the right path since I returned to Arendelle. Everything I've done was to the furtherance of my own ambition, but a part of me would have me believe that there's more power and glory to be found as your friend than as the sole ruler of this kingdom." He sighed. "You, far more than your sister, have shown me what I can expect for my cruelty."

Anna couldn't quite believe her ears. This calm, honest-sounding explanation was the last thing she would have guessed she'd hear. He was neither the flawless charming prince she'd met at the docks, nor the viciously angry creature from the dungeon, nor even the gloating madman who'd put a sword to her throat. He seemed almost more like her, so direct, and looking for answers. She shook her head, trying to throw off the desire to hear him out. This was _Hans_! He'd tried to kill Elsa! How could she listen to anything he said? "I don't... I don't care about your excuses." It sounded feeble even to her. He'd offered no excuses.

"I'm not making any." He looked up at her, still with that calm expression. "I _am_ your enemy. If I could kill you, and if killing you would get me anywhere, I'd do it. I know it wouldn't." He glanced out towards the hallway. "Let's pretend for a moment that I found some way to defeat your newfound powers, by taking advantage of your inexperience perhaps. Elsa would see me frozen in ice forever for it, and she'd live no longer than that, and all I'd have done was ruin both this kingdom and myself." He smiled slightly at her. "It horrifies you that I can say things like that so calmly, Anna, I can see that." He shrugged. "It comes of living among my brutish brothers all my life. And I'm a better leader for being able to face the worst of humanity, including what I see in the mirror."

He was right. She was horrified. She wanted to cover her ears, to scream, to run from the room and find Elsa and hold her and forget that Hans had ever existed. As he spoke, the images had formed in her mind, crystal clear. Him rushing her, the feel of cold steel, the creep of nothingness. A tomb made from ice surrounding him, and then Elsa's face, pale and grey, as lifeless as her own. She backed away until her back hit a wall. She smelled smoke, and realized her body was so hot that she was burning the wallpaper just by touching it. "Stop..."

He shook his head. "I'm not making you stay and listen to me. The door is right there. Go to your sister, demand that she lock me away as I no doubt deserve. She'll do as you say, you know that."

How did he _know_? How did he know her every thought, see her every move before she made it? How could he so easily express what she couldn't even put into words, the deeper truth Elsa would do _anything_ for her? She couldn't even speak, she just shook her head, refusing to give him the victory of being right by leaving.

He rose and walked to the window, glancing out before looking back at her. "I didn't put the ice in your heart. I took advantage of the opportunity. And don't pretend that, had you died, my attempt on your sister's life would have been anything but a mercy killing." He spread his hands. "I didn't lie about everything. I did care for you, and I still do. What you failed to understand is that I put myself first." He smiled wryly. "Don't worry, I don't expect you to throw yourself into my arms. Even aside from what I've done to you, you only tried to attach yourself to me because you thought Elsa was beyond your reach. Your heart belongs to her, if you'll pardon the irony, and it always has."

Ignoring her gaping, incredulous expression, he looked back out the window again. "I do beg your forgiveness for my earlier crude words. I'm no more a stranger to the heat of anger than you are. There is nothing tawdry or uncouth to your bond with her. It defies description, such a connection. True love, certainly, but there's little use pinning more words than that on it. Neither of you knows the difference anyway."

He bowed his head. "I envy you, Anna. What you've experienced in the last day, after years apart, is more than most people will ever know in all their lifetimes." He looked at her again, and she shrank from the anger on his face. "If there's anything I couldn't forgive you for, anything that'd push me to continue working against you rather than with you, it's that happiness. That joy you've kept for yourselves, without even knowing it."

Anna gasped for breath, feeling as if his fury was drawing the very air from the room. Her hands grasped for a hold, but she felt only the wallpaper curling to cinders under her fiery touch. She clenched her fists. "We haven't kept anything for ourselves! You said Elsa showed you kindness! You've talked to Olaf! How can you possibly say we're keeping anything away from you? You're the one who pushes it away every chance you get!"

He paused, the anger falling away from his features, replaced by a tiredness. "Maybe I am. You may have noticed, Princess, that I'm more fond of taking what I want than of having it offered to me. I don't want your kindness." He turned away, leaning bent over on his palms, laid flat against the windowsill. "You've won, Anna. Elsa's yours to do with what you like. Fire and ice, at your command. Arendelle, also yours. Isn't it a shame you don't know _what_ to do with any of it?"

"What-" She had to pause and take a breath. Her head was spinning. "Wh-What do you mean? You keep saying things I don't understand."

"At least you're asking now, instead of blindly denying it." He straightened and turned around again, sitting back down in the chair. "You already know Elsa would do anything for you. Don't you realize how far that extends? Her heart is yours to command. Her magic is yours to control. Her rule is yours to direct." He leaned forward. "Your sister is a child in the body of a woman. She has been handed leadership and magic. She has grace, elegance, beauty, wisdom, _power_. She doesn't have experience. She doesn't comprehend me and what I did, not really. She knows that you distrust and fear me, but she looked at me, without you there, and saw someone she wanted to help." He spread his hands again. "But look at how she acted when I first returned, with you at her side. Firm, decisive, commanding. She was pretending to be _you_, Anna."

Anna tried to step back again, but she was already pressed against the wall. "I'm not the Queen, she is!"

He shook his head. "The title and the crown don't mean anything. Hers is a wild spirit, aimless on her own, at her best with someone to keep her steady. You, specifically." He made a face. "It's a perfect match. You would burn yourself to nothing, in spirit if not in body, without her to tame you. While she was apart from you, while you knocked on a closed door, what else did you do? What else did you do, Anna? Were you anyone? Were you anything?"

His voice seemed echo about her, terrifying. She grabbed the sides of her head, covering her ears, trying to block it out. "Stop it! Stop!"

He just kept talking. "And what did you find when that door opened? Fear in the form of your sister? She fled. She ran. She pushed you away. Nothing could hold you back from following. Not a mountain. Not an endless winter, not me, not your kingdom. Nothing. You knew that without her, nothing was left for you."

"STOP!" Fire burst from her body in a rippling sphere, blasting outwards in all directions. The window shattered outward, the curtains turning to ash in an instant. As the energy passed through Hans, he cried out in pain and fell to the floor.

Anna found herself on her knees, the room full of smoke and cinders of smoldering wood. Hans lay motionless, his clothes singed, clutching his chest. She flashed back to a moment on the mountain, when Elsa's ice had struck her heart, remembered herself making a very similar motion. What had she done? She ran from the room, panicked, stumbling, her wild dash through the corridors a cruel parody of her dancing about. She couldn't just let him suffer, not even Hans. She needed Elsa. Elsa could help.


	26. Snow

Elsa had no idea what was going on. She'd woken up to Anna tugging at her and been dragged through the halls without any kind of coherent explanation at all. It was really kinda scary. Anna looked panicked, and there were little sparks coming off her. Every time a spark touched Elsa before dying out on its own, it popped out of existence with an audible fizzle, leaving tiny holes in her dress, and she couldn't concentrate enough to fix them.

Anna pulled her through the door of one of the guest rooms. The window was broken, the whole room smoldering. At first, she wanted to smile with relief. Her own reaction the first time she'd loosed ice all about her room had been one of shock, but it was hardly cause for so much upset. Then she saw Hans lying on the floor, and the forming smile vanished. The prince looked as if he'd tried to wrestle a bonfire, and he wasn't moving.

Shaking more than a little inside, she knelt down beside him. She wasn't quite sure what to do, but she remembered reading a story about a fiery knight wounded in battle against an ice demon. The knight had fallen, and her comrade had looked for a pulse to see if she was still alive. Elsa reached over and touched Hans' neck in the same place the book had described. There was a pulse, but it was racing and unsteady, and his skin was flushed, almost as hot as Anna's. She looked up at Anna. "Anna, what happened?"

To her relief, Anna seemed to be calming down a little. "He kept saying I was nothing, and he wouldn't stop, and I was scared, and angry, and there was a..." She wrapped her arms around herself as if cold. "There was fire, all around. I didn't mean to, Elsa, it just came out!"

Elsa shivered, remembering all too clearly a moment not very long ago when her own terror had unleashed a wave of sheer ice that had nearly killed her sister. "Neither did I..." She looked down at Hans' contorted expression, wondering fleetingly whether he could hear what they were saying, then up at Anna again. "Anna, I don't know how to undo your magic. I couldn't even stop mine until after you were already..." She trailed off, unwilling to say it.

She was caught by surprise when Anna reached over and grabbed her hand. "Maybe I can just do what you did!" She sat down on the other side of the motionless Hans and pulled his hands away from his chest.

Elsa was amazed, and more than a little frightened, to see a mass of roiling red energy just under Hans' skin, seemingly wrapped around his heart. She could feel the heat of it from where she knelt, enough to know it'd burn her if she touched it. She looked at her sister, but found no comfort in Anna's nervous, uneasy expression. She knew her own power was driven by her feelings. If the same was true of Anna... _What could he have said to her that made her do _this_? I never should have listened to him!_

If Anna was spending any time on self-recrimination for Hans' state, she wasn't showing it, placing her hands over the harsh light and closing her eyes. Elsa wondered fleetingly at her sister's immunity to the heat, then gave a tiny inner smile, remembering something she'd said to herself on the mountain. _The cold never bothered me anyway._

A brilliant yellow light, sparkles of white dancing throughout, formed around Anna's body, and spread quickly to Hans'. In stark contrast to the burning of the duller energy twisting inside him, this new brilliance was a soft, comforting warmth, as if Anna was projecting the comfort of being in her arms outward. The yellow surrounded the red, flickering as would a fire in a hearth, and the angry turmoil began to calm. It became steady, pulsing in time with Hans' heartbeat. The yellow light faded into the red, which now looked rather stately.

Anna looked over at Elsa, face flushed, eyes wide, as she lifted her hands away. The energies followed her motion, leaving Hans' form entirely and rising into the air. Elsa stared. Anna was trying to mimick what she'd done to call back the eternal winter: gathering the power, giving it new purpose, and letting it loose.

Hans started breathing calmly, his face restful, but Anna was struggling. The energy she'd pulled loose from him was now pulling itself loose from her. Elsa shrank away as the red light became angry again, and then snapped free of the invisible boundary that had contained it. The unleashed power streaked about the room, leaving scorch marks on the already blackened walls, turning still-smoldering embers into full-blown flame, and finally launching itself directly at her.

Anna cried out in protest, trying to get in the way before it reached her sister, but Elsa reacted faster. Frost spread across the entire room in an instant, putting out every flame, every smolder. Sparkling blue light formed a wall of ice between her and the firebolt. The bolt _splashed_ against the wall, melting most of the way through before finally dissipating altogether.

Breathing heavily, terrified by the close call and winded by the effort of using her powers, Elsa gave Anna a very shaky smile. "I guess part of you _really_ doesn't think I should've let him stay here."

She'd meant it as a joke, but pain stabbed through her chest when Anna glared at her instead of smiling back. "No! I'd never hurt you, Elsa! I didn't even know you were the one who let him out!"

She had no chance to answer. Hans reached up suddenly and grabbed for Anna's neck, but missed the mark and got a grip on the front of her dress instead. He yanked her down, snarling his words two inches from her face. "_Now_ do you see it? She is the source of your power." He heaved with all his strength, lifting Anna a few inches and sending her crashing into Elsa as he sat up, groaning in pain.

Elsa did her best to catch Anna, but between her sister's flailing and her own breathlessness, the result was a tangle of arms and legs and dresses, and a small explosion of snowflakes and sparks. In other circumstances, Elsa would have laughed, but she was too busy trying to keep a grip on a very upset Anna. She was more confused than ever. That was what Hans had said? That she was important to Anna? How in the world had that caused all this?

As the cloud of magic settled, Hans got to his feet, sneering down at the girls. "Have you considered following her example less completely, Queen Elsa?" He stumbled, catching himself against the ice wall. "I can only imagine having your heart turn slowly to ice is less painful than having it incinerated!"

Anna tried to stand, but she slipped on Elsa's dress. Elsa grimaced as Anna landed on her arm, but her sister didn't even seem to notice. "First of all, you wouldn't know! Secondly, it was an accident! And third, you're welcome for not just deciding you got what you deserved!"

He snorted. "Empty threats don't become you, Anna. If it were in your nature to let me die, you wouldn't have bothered to fish me out of the fjord after punching me in the face."

Elsa dragged herself loose from Anna's weight, sighing. "Enough, both of you. You're so alike, can't you even _try_ to be nice to each other, just pretend for the sake of everyone's peace of mind? Two days ago you wanted to get married."

Hans' instant protesting "I'm not some fool child!" overlapped with Anna's, "I'm nothing like him!"

She shook her head. "Anna, I've never seen you like this. It's scaring me..." She reached for Anna's hand. "Your powers are amazing, and Hans is just trying to upset you, and there's nothing to actually be upset about."

She was relieved when Anna stood up and hugged her, but Hans gave her little chance to enjoy it. "In case you've forgotten, Queen Elsa, my attempt at wooing your sister was hardly born of affection."

"Liar!" Anna glared at him, though her position snuggling Elsa robbed the expression of most of its effect. "You'd just said you actually _did_ like me and you're just too mean to care!"

Hans stumbled his way back to the nearby chair, as charred as it now was, and sat heavily in it. Elsa wondered unhappily how much pain he must have been in if he was showing it so easily. The idea of Anna hurting someone that badly or even at all, especially on her behalf, was unsettling at best. He sneered at them both. "Wasted effort. You only accepted me out of sheer desperation, and left me behind in an instant when she needed you." He gestured angrily at Elsa. "I take it back, Princess. She's right. You abandoned me, only came back in a useless attempt to save your own skin, and have since behaved as if my betrayal erased every feeling of 'true love' you claimed to have for me. You don't even bother to pretend that I did any more to you than wound your pride. All your anger is because I would've killed your precious sister to spare her living with thinking she'd killed you." He smirked. "You're more like me than I thought."

Elsa just barely managed to hold Anna back, summoning her powers to cool her body and draw some of the burning from Anna's. "Anna, stop it, you're just gonna prove him right!" Using every ounce of strength, she forced Anna to turn and look at her instead of Hans. "Anna, please calm down! Please, you're not like this!"

To her surprise, Hans didn't offer any comments, and the terrifying red that had begun to fill Anna's eyes receded. She almost collapsed with renewed relief, hugging herself tightly to her sister, and Anna clung to her in return.

A few moments passed before anyone spoke, but even Hans' tone was, if not kind, at least more muted than it had been. "Her magic will try to do to her what yours tried to do to you, Elsa." He crossed his arms, wincing slightly as the motion shifted his bruised ribs. "She has to learn control, or the moment you leave her alone she'll burn herself to ash and take you, and me, and probably all of Arendelle with her. You know better than anyone, such power will control you if you do not control it first."

Similar, if much less extreme, thoughts had been running through Elsa's head, but she had no idea how to even begin helping Anna learn to handle fire. "Hans, do you know anything about controlling magic?" She ignored Anna's eyeroll; she'd meant the question earnestly.

"Not a thing." He shrugged. "But I know plenty about self-control in general, to which your sister can attest. That, by the way, isn't something you have either. You're controlling your powers by virtue of not being afraid anymore, not because you can handle your fear."

She started to nod, then blinked. "How do you know that?"

He rose from the chair and walked towards them. Anna tried to get out in front of Elsa, but Elsa held her back. Couldn't Anna see that he wasn't threatening them? Sure enough, he stopped a full pace away, giving her a look full of something almost like pity. "My dear Elsa, it is as plain as the nose on your face. You two have been locked in this empty castle all your lives, a furnished dungeon to assuage your parents' fears. You know nothing about people. You even know that! 'Oh Anna, what do you know about true love?'" His imitation of Elsa's words was, while octaves lower, nonetheless rather precise.

Anna tried to interrupt, but he kept talking right over her. "What you think are great secrets of your souls are as obvious as your magic." He looked at Anna. "You, you're stuck in the middle between fear that I'll trick you again and fury at being tricked before. And all you want is to have Elsa to yourself so you can go back to learning what kissing her and being in her bed feels like to you. You've thought of her and only her for so long that you feel something you don't even know to call possessiveness. You run about with your ice merchant and do nothing but confuse and disappoint him, because she's your only thought. You tried to convince yourself you loved me and only succeeded in showing that you love her. You try to hate me, but hate isn't in you, so all you can do is be angry because you know that without her to tame you, to remind you of the innocent wonder that lives in your heart, you would be _lost_. You stupid, foolish girl, you always knew what true love was, you just didn't know to call it that."

His gaze turned back to Elsa. "And you, you're _terrified_ of what her new power's turning her into, with a little help from me. You wonder if it'll take her away. You wonder if it, or I, will turn her into someone who doesn't care about you anymore. You don't know what to make of her affections when she shows them. You don't understand anything but happiness that she wants to be around you and relief that she's safe from your magic. Losing her would leave you so helpless that you might as well die. I will repeat what I told her: You are a child, trapped in the body of a grown woman, and your ability to be 'queenly' is nothing but imitation of her confidence and some rote training in ritual." He sniffed derisively. "And the worst of it all is, you're both sitting here listening to me rather than acting on anything I've ever said to either of you!"

Anna jumped in before he could say any more, pushing in front of Elsa again. "Stop it! You're so mean! You're talking about us like we don't have minds that go with all the feelings!" She glared at him. "We were happy before you came back, all you've done is make trouble. Of course I want to be with my sister, and I don't even know what you're going on about with kissing. How do you even know about it? Why do you even care!"

Trying to prevent another explosion, Elsa quickly stepped between them. "Please, enough! This isn't helping anyone!" She shivered. "Hans, if you want to stay here, stop trying to manipulate her. You're just being spiteful... If you really want to help, you can do it without being mean. And you're right, we shouldn't be listening to it." She took Anna's hand, pulling at her sister and hoping Anna would get the message. "When you can be polite and act as nice as I've seen you act, we'll listen." She dragged a thankfully obedient Anna out of the room.

* * *

Pulling the door closed behind her, Elsa turned to Anna. "Anna, what's wrong?" She was shaking inside, and trying to hide it. Anna was always the one who comforted her, but ever since this new magic had appeared, everything kept seeming different. It was terrifying. Was she losing Anna, just as she'd finally been able to open the door? Anna's love, her happiness, the intensity of it, had been so wonderful! Even when it became just a little strange, like laying in bed with her for hours, or like that dance where it was so intense she could barely remember it, it was wonderful...

"I don't know." The fear in Anna's voice both scared and reassured Elsa. At least Anna being scared made sense. It was the anger that was so unlike her. "I don't know how to make these powers work, and I was trying to figure it out, and I thought I was getting it, and then I ran into him and he started out sorta nice a little and then he started being mean again, and it just came out!" Anna hugged her sister tightly. "Why did you let him out, Elsa? He just messes everything up, I just want to be with you, he makes it sound like I'm not supposed to!"

Elsa couldn't help but smile. "Anna, that's just silly." She wasn't sure what Hans was going on about either, but from his tone, it sounded like he was trying to say that Anna was being mean and selfish. It _was_ silly! Anna might be headstrong, stubborn, act without thinking, but selfish? Hurtful? Never. "He'll just have to get used to being nice. And we both know that our powers aren't always easy to control." She took Anna's hands in both her own, smiling brightly. "We'll figure it out together, just like you tried to tell me back on the mountain."

Anna smiled back at her, warming her heart. "Wow, you were actually listening?"

She giggled. "Well you did say it at least five times." She almost couldn't believe it was so easy to feel happy again, but Anna's smile was enough to push away the upset and doubt. On the mountain all she'd had was fear of hurting Anna, but that had no more power over her.

* * *

Hans paced about, ignoring the pains in his chest. Was the taunting voice in his head right? Was trying to torment those two simply doomed to failure? He barely recognized what he felt at seeing them hand-in-hand. It was a sense of _wonder_, of admiration! He'd hated them for their closeness, envied their powers, but it was all starting to fade away. It was as if the fire Anna had used against him, as painful as it was, had also burned away a darkness inside, though he knew that couldn't be true.

He looked around at the charred and scorched furniture, the blasted window, the little pile of ash that was all that was left of the curtains. This power could have killed him, even more easily than Elsa's ice. And there were so many possibilities to mixing such magics together. If he turned on them again, he would never see what they could do.

_And Elsa really would forgive you. She is a child, but she is growing. They're not frozen in time anymore. You have a chance to be a part of this, help them, return home a greater man than any of your brothers will ever be, witness to wonders and fulfillment beyond them!_


	27. Flame

A blond man wandered aimlessly away from an open door. Someone who saw him might have said he was confused, but even if they'd said his name, he wouldn't have answered. He might have asked how to get to the stables, at most.

* * *

After a couple minutes of just snuggling her sister, other things besides Elsa's smile started to come back into Anna's head. "It's so strange thinking I have powers too, Elsa." The gentle chill of Elsa's skin, which she'd noticed many times already, struck a chord in her thoughts. "Am I warm the way you're cold?"

Her sister had been quiet, wearing a rather content expression, but at the question she adopted a much more considering look. She took Anna's hand, and pressed their palms together. "I think you are, Anna. Why?"

Anna giggled, taking Elsa's other hand the same way. "If we both have magic, maybe it works the same way. Aren't you curious?" She felt power starting to flow through her, in her chest, down her arms, but she held it back. She didn't _think_ it could hurt Elsa, not after seeing her raise a wall of ice at the speed of thought, but she wasn't taking chances. Her eyes widened as she felt Elsa's palms grow colder, much colder. Was Elsa actually feeling the same thing? She'd just been guessing!

"If it's the same, you're holding back right now." And Elsa gave her a look she knew very well, that impish grin of their barely-remembered childhood- _"Do you wanna build a snowman?"_.

And Elsa had always wanted to. Always. Anna let the fire flow through her. It needed no direction, only for her to let go of it. She felt her hands begin to burn with it, but there was no pain. It was like rays of sunlight from within. "I just didn't want to hurt you." She laughed again. "I guess I know how you felt! But I get it now, it was being afraid that made that happen." She smiled. "I'm not afraid, Elsa."

Sparkling blue light curled around Elsa's fingers, met by a warm, red glow. Anna took a sudden breath, hardly able to believe the sensation. It glittered, playing at the tips of her fingers, toying with Elsa's. It _tingled_! She felt raw potential running back and forth between them, tickling her brain. Her voice was a whisper. "What do we do with it?"

Elsa leaned in just a little, also whispering. "Play!" She let go of one of Anna's hands, holding tight to the other. A trail of purple, shaded all through from blue to red to black to white and back again, followed the motion. A burst of half-melted ice splattered out, thwacking wetly to the floor. Little gouts of sputtering fire shot randomly in every direction, all dying out within a second.

Anna made a face, finding the result rather ugly, but Elsa clenched her fingers around her hand before she could pull away. "Anna, you're trying too hard to control it." Her smile was instantly calming. "It's fire. Stop trying to shape it." The words made such sudden, perfect sense that Anna was amazed she hadn't thought of it herself. How could Elsa know how to handle fire? No, that didn't matter. She tried to relax, just let the magic work. It was surprisingly hard. Why was it so hard to just let go?

_Because I'm still afraid, I don't want to hurt her!_ One moment of emotion and she'd nearly killed Hans, and her power had gone straight at Elsa when she'd lost control trying to fix it. And she'd felt firsthand what _Elsa's_ fear could do. Sickly half-hearted flames continued to emerge from the band of melded magic they'd made. _I can't hurt her._ She grabbed hold of the thought, forced herself to focus on it. _I would never hurt Elsa. And she wouldn't ever hurt me!_ She hadn't stayed frozen. The ice had melted, and far more quickly than it had formed. _Even Hans said so! If he says I'm nothing without Elsa, then that means I'm everything with her!_

A surge of joy at the thought was followed by a wave of fresh power. It exploded outward, turning the sputtering band into a translucent sphere that filled most of the room, with them at its center. The interior was shot through with a brilliantly-lit snowstorm, as if they stood inside a well-shaken snow globe set beneath a noonday sun. Anna laughed with delight, spinning about, keeping tight hold of Elsa's hand. "Elsa, what's going on?" The wonder of it was too much; she couldn't stop laughing.

It took a breathless Elsa a few seconds to answer. "Something wonderful!" The great globe turned dark, but the snowflakes around them began to gleam as if lit from the inside. Anna was bathed in an incredible shower of rainbow light, constantly shifting. Every single flake, rather than melting as it reached the floor, burst into glitter, and Anna felt power radiating from each one. The ones that landed on Elsa began to gleam like diamonds; the ones that landed on Anna herself turned to steam that rose from her body like smoke, refracting even more of the light about them. It was blinding, yet she could see perfectly.

She couldn't help herself. She all but leapt forward, kissing Elsa wildly. There was no thought behind it, just giddy happiness. She wasn't even surprised anymore when Elsa eagerly returned the kiss, but she kept her eyes open, not wanting to miss what their combined magic was doing.

The sphere began to shrink around them, but then it blew outward again, this time disappearing from the room entirely, taking the snow and the light with it. But Anna could still see it! It was ballooning away. In seconds it had engulfed the whole castle. More dimly, she was aware that Elsa's body was freezing cold against hers, but she was burning too much inside for it to matter. The great bubble of magic they'd made kept growing, until it was as large as all Arendelle, crossing the entire fjord.

Anna had a faint glimpse of the North Mountain, and then of the Southern Isles, before it finally faded away and she found herself with Elsa in her arms. And even here, back in this one room, things were different. Elsa's dress had been remade, now with a slightly lower neck and shining a shade deeper blue, with more sparkle than it had already possessed. Anna's eyes wandered downwards, enough to catch a glimpse of herself. She was now wearing a daringly short dress, barely going below her knees! It hugged itself to her body as if only just large enough for her. It was all in reds and yellows, flowing and silken, a leftover breeze from the snow causing it to flutter as if it were a billowing flame. And the neck was as low as Elsa's!

She had no chance to reflect on what had just happened. A voice from the hallway - Kai's voice - was calling out, "Queen Elsa! Princess Anna!" Receiving no immediate answer, he called again, the sound closer this time. He was searching the rooms for them.

Not wanting to have to face the rest of the world just yet, Anna looked to her sister, but Elsa's gently amused expression told her she wasn't going to get a choice in the matter. "In here, Kai," Elsa said, her soft, calm voice carrying in a way that made Anna wonder if there wasn't just a little bit of magic involved.

A moment later, Kai rushed in, breathing a sigh of relief upon seeing them. "There you are, Your Majesties! Something very strange just happened. We don't quite know what to make of it!" He paused there, looking at them, obviously stifling either comment or at least a disapproving expression in favor of an answer about the "very strange" thing.

"Everything's alright, Kai. It was just an experiment." Elsa sounded so calm, so certain. So commanding!

_How does she _do_ that!_ Maybe everyone else expected the Queen of Arendelle to always be so queenly, but Anna _knew_ better. She looked at Elsa, and all she saw under so much beauty was a girl younger than herself, full of wonder, not afraid anymore but still so shy, so helpless. Yet to hear her speak to Kai, or Kristoff, or even Hans, anyone could have thought Elsa a power to be reckoned with, a firm and confident ruler.

Anna only saw her sister. Someone who Hans was _right_ about, someone who was as lost and alone without Anna as Anna was without her. Maybe even more. Magic continued to flicker all through her body and mind, a fire burning away everything but raw clarity. She knew bits of the light were visible around her, that Kai could see it. It wasn't important. She wasn't sure what was anymore.

All her life, Elsa had hidden herself away from her powers. _She even hid from me._ Anna took a deep breath. _I won't hide. Let them see._ She squeezed Elsa's hand hard, then let go.

The second Elsa's touch fell away, she knew she'd made a mistake. Fire rose within her, around her, in an instant. The dress she was wearing was aflame; she realized suddenly that it was literally _made of fire_. She could feel it burning in her eyes, searing through her bones and her blood, and there was no pain, only power. Too much power. She couldn't hold it back. Elsa had been helping her. She hadn't even realized. What she'd done to Hans, that was nothing, _nothing_ compared to what she was capable of.

It didn't surprise her. So many feelings, but not surprise. Elsa had built an entire palace from ice, frozen the fjord, held all Arendelle in coldest winter during the heart of summer, created life not once but _three_ times with an effort of will! There was no reason _not_ to think her own powers would be as strong. But that only made it worse, she couldn't control it. It was too late even to reach for Elsa again, it was already loose.

She wasn't sure what happened next. There was a blank moment, and then there was ice everywhere. Just ice, all around. The room was thick with it. Every surface, every corner. The fire was only inside her now. And Elsa was on her knees in front of her, holding her hands. Tears on her cheeks. _Afraid_. "Anna?" The word was a whisper, full of fear and confusion and desperation and a terrible, lonely cry for help.

No thought went into her answer. Arms around her sister, holding her close with all her strength, not even room to breathe in the first moments, just the absolute truth that she was there.

What _was_ all this? All this magic and all these feelings, so much she couldn't understand, or at least didn't care to. For just an instant there had been something normal, and then it all came down on her again. Was anything ever going to be safe again?

She looked over at Kai, who stood in the one island of floor in all the room that was neither frozen over nor scorched. He was absolutely still, as if not daring to move, but ever the loyal servant, he met her gaze without hesitation or doubt. And for once, Elsa seemed in no shape to be the Queen. She managed a small smile, determined to at least be the Princess in Elsa's place. "Go tell everyone it's alright, Kai."

Kai, bless his heart, didn't question. He only bowed and ran to obey, somehow managing not to slip on the ice, leaving Anna still holding a quickly calming Elsa. She looked at her sister's face and couldn't decide whether to laugh or just stare at the smile. "Elsa, what's _happening_ to us?"

Elsa just kept smiling. "All the strange and magical and wonderful things that happen when we're happy and nothing can keep us apart. Anna, just smile. You came after me, you found me, you saved me, just like I always dreamed you would! I'm here for you, you're here for me-"

"-and that's what matters." Anna finished the sentence with her, laughing and hugging. "But next time, can I make a dress that's a little longer?"

Elsa glanced down, then blushed. Anna started laughing harder. _She didn't even notice!_


	28. Grace

Kristoff was so lost in his thoughts that he almost didn't see Kai coming down the hallway towards him. He jumped out of the way at the last moment. "Hey, watch it!"

Kai bowed in a rather perfunctory manner, obviously in a rush. "Excuse me, sir." He started to hurry on his way, but Kristoff grabbed his arm before he could get any distance.

"Hey, slow down! Where are you going so fast? Did you see Anna? What was that- that light?" As if he hadn't seen enough strange things already, now there were big globes or something of magic flying around! And if Kai was coming from that direction, that meant he had to have come from that room! Of course, that also meant he'd missed seeing Kai go in there in the first place, but that at least made sense.

"Princess Anna commanded me to reassure everyone that there's nothing to worry about, sir. That's all I know about it." Kai pulled away, bowed again, rather hastily, and hurried off down the hall.

Kristoff stared after him, but he had no chance to answer before a second voice spoke. "You have the look of a man who's seen an unpleasant truth, ice merchant."

Oh, that was _all_ he needed! He spun to face the source of the voice. "Why aren't you in the dungeon!"

Hans leaned casually against a closed door. Kristoff couldn't help noticing a bit of smoke was leaking out from under that door, and that Hans himself looked more than a little singed around the edges. "The gracious Queen Elsa has seen fit to offer me another chance to prove I'm not the vile traitor I showed myself to be." He smirked. "I'm sorry to say, she may yet turn out to be right. There's something about those girls. Perhaps you've noticed?"

Did he mean...? "What are you talking about?"

The prince's face didn't change. "Simply that it's difficult indeed not to admire them, despite their innocence." He leaned towards Kristoff slightly, with raised eyebrows. "Would _you_ dare test your dear Princess' temper, boy? Would you have even before she found this fire?"

He blinked. "What? Her temper? Anna doesn't have a temper."

Hans snorted, gesturing at himself. "You mean you haven't made her angry. She nearly burned my heart out of my chest. Perhaps deservedly, but oh yes, there's anger in her. I thought even you could see it. She needs no magic to have fire in her soul, and only her sister can safely touch it."

How was this man so good at making him angry? Everything he said, even the nice parts, just felt all wrong. "I don't understand, what are you trying to say? Why do you even care what I think?" _I really should just go find some carrots for Sven._

As Hans stood up straight and started walking, Kristoff had a glimmer of hope that the prince would just walk right past him without another word. He wasn't quite that lucky. "I envy you, boy. You almost sound as if you could be content with seeing them together." And only then did Hans keep walking.

Kristoff didn't even bother trying to stop him. Why had every conversation he had with anyone become about Elsa and Anna and their relationship, anyway? They were sisters and they had magic, what was so complicated about it? He needed to go back to hanging out with Sven more. That was the _opposite_ of complicated. Maybe he could even go stay with his family for awhile instead of this place.

Of course, then he'd have to spend forever explaining that Anna wasn't with him and there was no stupid marriage thing. The only way to make that stick would be the say she was taken. Okay, so saying she was engaged hadn't worked last time, but she'd also been right there, it'd probably work if he went back alone. Of course, there was the problem of just who she was taken by. He had no idea how to explain _that_ one.

_Well, maybe Grandpabbie will understand._ He'd sure figured out that whole fire magic thing right off! Kristoff turned to head for the castle's entrance. It was gonna be a relief anyway, getting out of this big stuffy place.

* * *

Hans watched from behind an archway as Kristoff hurried away. _So, the boy has the sense to run. Curse him._ He hadn't lied. He envied the boy. So simple a mind, so unconcerned. And yet, there was something. Why had the boy looked so affected? The magic just wasn't enough to explain it. What had he seen?

No, it didn't matter. Forget the boy. There were far more important questions. Such as when those girls would realize there was a kingdom waiting for them to emerge. He'd seen it in the troubled bustling of the servants, the uncertainty on every face to be found. The queen wouldn't be able to hide any longer, not after such an obvious display of power.

He felt like laughing. Less than a day before, he would have seized the opportunity to simply take over the place himself. But the old ambitions, the need to win at any cost, felt tired and flat now. Instead, his mind was alight with fascination. As much as it had hurt, Anna's power had also changed something. That girl, that beautiful, enchanting girl, had done something to him. Had she burned away a darkness? Sown her fire in his heart? Set something alight in his soul? He didn't know, or care. Let others worry for such abstractions. _I'm going to see what she can do._

* * *

Elsa followed Anna down the hallway, letting herself be pulled by the hand. She felt a strange mixture of delight and fear, as if she were on the edge of some great change, something new. Anna's fire, their moments together becoming more and more amazing, the horizons of her own power shown to even greater than she'd ever imagined. _There's a world waiting for us!_ A vast world, one they'd been locked away from all their lives.

And Anna was with her. Anna would always be with her.


	29. Mirror

The throne room loomed. Elsa looked around, wondering how it had suddenly become so foreboding. She'd been here many times before. A _day_ ago she'd confronted Hans here, and it had been a familiar, comfortable place. What had changed? She felt like shivering. She _never_ shivered. She turned to look at Anna, wondering if her sister felt it too.

No such luck. Anna was still her cheerful self. If anything, she looked even happier than usual. Elsa pursed her lips, remembering how Anna had greeted her with a smile even up on the North Mountain. Nothing could hold Anna's mood down for long. Elsa's flight, Hans' betrayal, a frozen heart, Hans' return and his taunts, the fire burning through her, the moments between them Elsa still had no words for, the enormous, unexplained magic they'd created, _none_ of it seemed to give Anna much pause. Not that Elsa was complaining. Anna's smile was always enough to make her feel better. It was even helping right now. "Anna, does this room feel different to you at all?"

To her surprise, Anna reached over and kissed her, just a short, gentle brushing of lips. Did she have any idea just how intense even a tiny gesture like that felt? "You're just worried about actually being the Queen finally, Elsa. Don't let it get to you, you're gonna be fine and no one is scared of your powers." She giggled. "_Our_ powers."

It was just a little bit spooky how Anna could instantly see through what was really bothering her. Sure, no one had made a fuss about that explosion, or whatever it had been, once they'd explained where it came from. But Elsa was still having trouble shaking the unreasonable worry that it was an act, that even though Anna had more than accepted her magic, others were still afraid of it.

It was silly, and she knew it. Since the secret of her powers had been revealed, no one other than that Duke had done any worse than look worried by the magic happening around them, and that had been when there was a winter in the middle of summer! Even Hans had been out for personal gain, he'd never been afraid of her. And the only person who'd been put off by Anna's magic was- _Kristoff..._

Elsa still had no idea what had made Kristoff run off so suddenly. He'd just left the castle, taking Sven and Olaf with him. The last person who'd seen him was Hans, and all she could get out of him was that Kristoff had gone to visit the rock trolls. It seemed a natural enough thing, the trolls were his family after all, but something didn't ring quite true. Had Anna's powers actually upset him somehow?

Something else, another possible explanation, tickled the back of her mind, but she decided to ignore it. She had other things to focus on. Kristoff's motivations would just have to wait. It was still a shame, though; Anna really liked him, and he'd done so much for them both.

She held onto Anna's hand for a second longer, then let go and slowly sat down on the throne. It instantly iced up under her.

A blush spread over her face as Anna started giggling. Okay, so she was nervous. She concentrated for a moment, and the frost melted away in a faint sparkle of light, but her sister just kept on laughing. "Anna!"

Anna made a visible effort to stifle herself, but she was still grinning ridiculously wide. Elsa just shook her head, knowing that was the best she was going to get. Not that there was anything wrong with smiling, but she was hoping to look at least a _little_ dignified for her first official duties as the Queen of Arendelle. It was already bad enough that Anna was standing around with nowhere to sit down. For whatever reason, whoever was responsible for putting the throne room in order hadn't seen the need for any chairs. _What did Mother do when Father was sitting here?_

Maybe it would have been less noticeable if Anna wasn't still wearing that knee-length dress. Still in her icy garment, the length of it bunched up slightly behind her on the throne where it hadn't simply flowed to the floor, Elsa certainly understood not wanting to bother with traditional clothing any longer. Once she'd figured out how to adorn herself magically, she hadn't even thought to wear anything else. For one thing, no hand-sewn dress, no matter how expertly made, could fit quite so well. And if she was honest with herself, she sort of liked the bare shoulders and low neckline afforded her by what she had on. She'd made it that way, after all.

Which meant Anna had made hers to look the way she wanted too. She forced down another blush. Why it mattered to her whether Anna had dressed like that on purpose, she had no idea. And why did she keep wondering whether Anna was doing that just for her? Never mind that it wasn't really suitable for formal duties in the first place, but Elsa had no room to speak on that herself. Besides, Anna's dress was really pretty anyway!

* * *

By the time a few hours had gone by, Elsa was past wondering why she'd been worried about a little thing like Anna's legs showing. She was just grateful for Anna's seemingly limitless energy. How in the _world_ had Anna known the first thing about the politics of the Northern Isles? If she hadn't stepped in when Elsa completely blanked on the name of the Lord's son, the whole conversation would have fallen apart. She was also doubly grateful she'd kept her dress; the cooling effect of the ice was keeping her from sweating in a very unladylike fashion.

The throne room was finally almost empty again, at least. Only Anna and Kai were left now, and Kai was busily rearranging one of the banners to display more prominently. She turned to her sister. "Anna, how did Papa do this every day?"

Anna put her hands on Elsa's shoulders, squeezing gently. Her palms were hot, almost but not quite burning. It felt _really_ nice. "Lots of practice, I guess. It's not like you're supposed to be perfect right away." She giggled lightly. "The look on your face when that guy from Wesselton asked about your 'dark sorcery', though!"

Elsa whimpered, looking up at Anna. "You don't think I should have been more patient with him, do you?"

Of course, Anna rolled her eyes. "You weren't the one who set his coat on fire! Besides, you did send that Duke away before, they should've known better."

"You're lucky he was too surprised by _your_ 'dark sorcery' to run away before I could put it out." She leaned back a little into Anna's hands. "You didn't mean to do that, did you." It wasn't really a question.

There was a slight pause before Anna answered. "Not exactly... I mean, I did kinda want to, but I didn't actually mean for it to happen, you know?"

Elsa smiled, reaching up to take Anna's hands. Tiny currents of energy coursed through her fingers, tingling, as if her powers refused to be at rest when she so much as touched her sister. "At least it's something you actually thought. My powers seemed to have a mind of their own sometimes."

Anna squeezed Elsa's hands in return. The power running through them intensified, but Anna didn't comment on it, at least not directly. "Well mine don't seem to pay much attention to what I want." Another pause. "Except maybe a little when I was kissing you."

She glanced at Kai, but he was - probably deliberately - paying no attention. She stared up into Anna's eyes. "And right now?"

That earned her a laugh and a hug. "Well I'm not kissing you right now, am I!" Anna promptly gave the lie to her own words by leaning over to smooch her, a little sloppily. Would Anna ever stop being so completely shameless? Not that Elsa didn't love it. She felt as if she were at the mercy of Anna's enthusiasm, carried along by a whirlwind of feeling.

The effect was somewhat broken when Anna, leaning too far over the side of the throne, slipped and fell, landing in Elsa's lap in a bit of a tangle. Elsa yelped and tried to grab hold to steady her sister, but got a view straight up Anna's skirt and a handful of breast for the trouble. Blushing brightly, she just pulled her hands away completely. "Anna, stay still!"

Anna didn't listen, of course, and without Elsa's hands to support her, managed to flail herself right onto the floor with a dull _thud_. Elsa winced and reached down to help Anna up, but had to snatch her hand away again when Anna's skin turned out to be too hot to touch. "Anna?"

Her sister looked up at her, laughing. Elsa realized belatedly that Anna'd been laughing all along. She suddenly felt very silly for worrying. "You're blushing so much!" Anna picked herself up and hopped right back into Elsa's lap, mischief written all over her. "Oh Queen Elsa, I'm only a poor confused Princess, won't you rescue me from my lonely life?" She gave Elsa a ridiculously forlorn look, eyes crossed.

Elsa burst out laughing, hugging Anna as tight as she could. The burning heat was still there, but it wasn't bothering her now; she was too busy feeling happy. "As if you weren't the one who rescued me, Anna!" In everything that had happened, she'd almost forgotten how downright _silly_ her sister could be. How had she ever shut Anna out?

Kai glanced at them. "Your Majesties, the emissary from the Southern Isles will arrive any moment now." His tone was ever so gently chiding, and Elsa blushed all over again, remembering also how much trouble Anna could get into with her reckless fun.

"The _Southern_ Isles?" Anna blinked. "You mean where Hans is from?"

A nod. "Yes, Princess. I believe the Prince is what they are here to speak to you about."

It didn't surprise Elsa one bit that Anna would have forgotten that particular meeting. "Hans' ship sent word ahead that he was going back. They're probably just wondering here he is."

Kai nodded agreement. "Meaning no disrespect, your Majesties, but perhaps for the sake of dignity?"

He didn't specify, but he didn't have to. Elsa lifted Anna off her lap, straining with the effort. Anna might be stronger than she looked; Elsa wasn't. "Anna, it's the last one today, we can-" She paused, not sure what to call it. "Play" didn't quite seem to cover Anna's mischief. Or her flirting. _I think that's what it's called._ "We'll have fun afterwards."

Anna just grinned at her, but if she had any answer, it was interrupted by the entrance of a tall, thin man, wearing a formal suit not unlike Hans'. He walked up to the throne, towering over them both, and bowed, in rather perfunctory fashion. Elsa had the distinct impression the man had no actual respect for her at all. There was a disapproving sneer on his face, becoming even more noticeable as he looked at Anna.

She refused to cower under his gaze. "Welcome to Arendelle, sir." Rather than standing up to match his height, which she couldn't have done anyway, she remained sitting. "What brings you before us?" As it had all day, the tone and phrasing of royalty felt unnatural on her lips. She was no stranger to formality, but she'd started her reign by casting off all the closed doors and boundaries of the life she'd spent hidden in her room, and the time with Anna since had only given her an even greater sense of freedom. In fact, most of the sensation of oddness came from Anna. Her sister was the opposite of formality.

Oops. She'd almost missed the emissary's answer while she was thinking. "Three days past, we received word that Hans Westerguard, Prince of our Realm, would be returning to us. He has not arrived. My lord, the King of the Southern Isles, demands an explanation for the absence of his son."

Her instinct was to respond with the simple truth of the matter, that Hans had chosen to stay. But she'd been taught that, in politics, it was just as important to not appear subservient to others as it was to be honest and fair. "Prince Hans is guilty of attempted murder and treason. His absence should not come as a surprise to you." She let a moment pass - a heartbeat, no more. "However, the message you received was true, at the time it was sent. Prince Hans chose of his own accord, after that time, to return to Arendelle."

The emissary sniffed derisively. "If he were guilty of all that, why would he choose to stay?" He shook his head. "You play a dangerous game. My lord will not allow the captivity of the Prince to stand. Do not think that we are children who would fear your magic, ice witch."

Elsa had no chance to react to the words, or the insulting tone. Anna was already standing in front of her, fire in her eyes. Literally. "You _don't_ talk about my sister that way." She took another step forward. "And you don't call her a liar, either. It sure wasn't our idea for Hans to stick around! You can ask him, if you don't believe us!"

It was the same sentiment Elsa would have expressed, though she definitely would have been less aggressive about it. Couldn't Anna tell the man was trying to upset her on purpose? She reached out and gently pushed Anna back. "As Anna says, sir, you are welcome to consult with Prince Hans yourself." _Please, Anna, don't lose control..._ To her relief, Anna's eyes dimmed back to normal. It seemed like, even if her sister didn't have a complete grip on her powers, they were at least less desperate to escape than Elsa's own had been.

Unfortunately, the emissary obviously wasn't feeling much relief of his own. "I have no reason to believe anything the Prince has to say under duress." He sneered at them both. "You have one week to return him to us, unharmed, or there will be severe consequences." He turned and strode towards the door.

A wall of ice blocked his path. Elsa rose to her feet, trying to muster an angry, or at least stern, expression to cover the upset she actually felt. "We will neither confine Prince Hans to Arendelle, nor force him to leave against his will. The choice is his. There is no need for threats."

He turned to face her again. "I also have no reason to believe you, witch, nor your demon sister. I demand that you allow me to leave at once!"

Elsa hesitated just a few seconds, not daring to back down so quickly. The insults didn't bother her, they were just words. She knew now she was no monster. The man's behavior reminded her of Hans. Except, Hans had been angry and vengeful, not pointlessly _spiteful_. And she also knew from her studies that the King of the Southern Isles was neither a warmonger nor unreasonable. Something was wrong here. Finally, she withdrew the ice, grateful that Anna had the sense not to interrupt again. "Go. And tell your lord King that Arendelle remains his friend."

For a moment, she thought he wasn't going to go, but she was thankfully proven wrong when he turned again and stormed out the now-open door. She sank immediately back down, grabbing Anna's arm and clinging to it tightly. It took a moment for even Anna's hug to calm her; she had no taste for confrontation at all. On the mountain, she'd been fighting for her life, and Hans' words had just reminded her of her true self. It had been a very strange thing for him to say, in fact, if he'd really thought she was a monster and wanted her out of his way. It was almost as if he'd struggled with his ambition before finally deciding to turn on them entirely.

She shook off the rambling train of thought, burying her face in the intense yet soothing warmth of Anna's shoulder. There was a subtle, shifting gleam to her sister's skin. She wondered if fire had taken up residence just beneath. It burned to the touch, but Elsa felt no pain. The heat seemed to flow into her body and disperse, as if she were absorbing it. Anna's breathing slowed just a little as she held Elsa. Was she unknowingly containing Anna's powers?

Her thoughts were cut short again, this time by Anna herself. "What was all that even about? He was completely unreasonable!" She was obviously upset, and Elsa didn't blame her. It was true, the man had seemed absolutely determined to hear only what he wanted to. And he'd leapt instantly to the conclusion that he was being deceived.

"I think he already knew everything he was going to say before he came in. He didn't really listen to anything I said." Elsa nuzzled just a little at Anna's shoulder and arm, wishing more than anything to lose herself in the soothing warmth and absolute safety of her sister's closeness, and knowing she couldn't do so just yet. "Hans may know more about what's going on. We should ask him."

Naturally, Anna tensed at the suggestion. "Elsa, I'm tired of having to talk to him all the time! Ever since he came back we've spent more time with him than with each other!"

The same thought had already occurred to her. As much sympathy as she felt for Hans, Anna was right. If only she could just leave the world to its own devices. Anna _was_ the whole world to her! "It'll only take a few minutes, Anna." She smiled up at Anna, standing up and giving her a proper hug. "And then I'm yours."

She felt yet another blush starting to form. Why had she said _that_?

* * *

Hans sneered at them. "You fools. Anders is less trustworthy than I am." He gave Elsa a rather piercing look. "If he said Anna is beautiful, then with her standing before me I would first assume she were the ugliest woman ever to curse this world."

He smirked internally as Anna bristled. Of course the girl would refuse to see that he'd just paid her a compliment. "So when he said there'd be 'consequences' if you don't go back, there aren't?"

A shame she had to be so naive. The dress she was wearing complimented her so well. A show of intellect would have lent it even more value. "Of course there are. However much a villain you thought me, I guarantee you, my brother is worse. He has no interest in me. He only wants an excuse to attack what he thinks is a threat." He leaned in to give Elsa a rather serious look. "Your powers, and Anna's, _are_ a threat. A pity he has no way of knowing how weak you two are."

As he'd expected, Anna immediately moved to defend her sister. He said the words with her in unison, his tone sharp with irony. "Elsa isn't weak!"

He laughed at the astonished look on her face, taking note that Elsa showed no surprise at all. "You keep making the same mistake, Anna. I've told you over and over, and even the ice merchant boy understood. I said you _two_ are weak. Yes, Elsa froze the whole kingdom, very impressive, but that was in a moment of terror. Her heart is too gentle to do it by intent. And your fire? You were horrified by what you nearly did to me. But we've _all_ seen the evidence of how powerful you are together. No doubt that's what moved Anders to act now."

Anna blinked. "You mean he's been waiting here? But it's only been a few days!"

True, events had moved with great speed. "He could well have arrived here before I did. The news of your sister's coronation was hardly a secret." He looked at Elsa. "All he had to do was see me here, learn of your powers, assume that I would fail in my own efforts to control you, and wait for any reason to confront you." _And _curse_ him for being right!_ "He's no fool. He wouldn't threaten you unless he really did have some counter for your magic."

Elsa shook her head. "But he couldn't have known about Anna's powers. Besides us, only Kristoff has seen them. He only saw her with fire just now."

It was easy to forget how sharp Elsa was, for all her childishness and innocence. If only Anna would have had such a mind. "Whatever he's planned will probably only work on you. Maybe, if you're lucky, it won't distract Anna too much for her to do anything about it."

* * *

Anna plopped herself down in a chair, pulling an obviously willing Elsa into her lap. She couldn't believe how relieved she was to have a door between her and the rest of the world, as long as Elsa was on the same side of it. Especially now, with yet another problem looming. The day of peace and quiet they'd had hardly seemed enough.

She distracted herself by admiring her sister. There was certainly plenty to admire. From the flawless dress made from ice, to the fullness of her lips, the flow of her blonde hair, the curves of her body, and especially the constant tickle and tingle of energy flowing through and between them, everything about Elsa was so perfect. She reached up and caught Elsa in a kiss, passionate and unashamed.

As Anna had known she would, Elsa wrapped herself tightly around her and returned the kiss, eager, yet also shy. Snowflakes swirled around them, mixed with mischievous firelights. Anna was instantly overwhelmed by sensation, acutely aware of the burning desire running through her. She pulled Elsa closer, desperate for more of her. Despite more and more time with Elsa in her arms, she still didn't understand the passion and need she kept feeling. But she didn't care. It felt too good. And besides, three days was hardly any length of time to understand something so powerful in.

It might have been minutes or hours that passed as they embraced, lost in each other. As intense as the passion was, it was nothing compared to Anna's desperation to simply be close to Elsa. They'd been apart so long. Neither spoke; there was too much relief in being together to ruin it with conversation. Anna reached to kiss her sister again. At first, it was just like the last several kisses, but then she realized that Elsa was moving, pulling away. She opened her eyes to see what was wrong, then stared in shock.

Elsa wasn't pulling away. She was _shrinking_. Her body was getting smaller- no, not just smaller, _younger_. For an instant, Anna was too amazed to do anything but stare back into Elsa's confused eyes. Then, acting on an instinct she couldn't name, she hugged Elsa as tight as she could and let loose the fire within her.

The energy _detonated_ inside the room, blasting the door out of its frame, destroying most of the furniture, blowing out the window, and setting almost everything that wasn't already turned to ash on fire.

When Anna came back to her senses a moment later, her whole body was burning. She felt feverish to the point of nausea, and her dress was in tatters. The now much smaller Elsa's was simply gone altogether, not a trace remaining, and her lips were still pressed to Anna's.

Anna pulled herself away just enough to break the contact. She didn't think she could let go of Elsa entirely; the heat gave everything the nightmare feel of a delirium. Her body responded only slowly and reluctantly to her intentions. She had no idea what she'd just done, or why, or how. She wasn't even sure any of it was real. Why did Elsa look different? And why was there all this fire?

At least Elsa was there. Her Elsa. Soft and cool. The chill gently drew the heat away from her. She thought she felt Elsa's hand on her cheek, but her eyes slowly closed. She heard distant shouting, and then Elsa's voice, higher than it should have been, before her consciousness drifted away. "Anna?"


	30. Purity

_Burning._

_Everything was burning._

_The North Mountain, a pyre of hellish light. The water and ice of the fjord, boiling. Arendelle ablaze. The palace an effigy in fire._

_Hans. Kristoff. Kai. Gerda. Olaf._

_Mama! Papa!_

_Elsa..._

_ELSA!_

* * *

The terrible nightmare image of Elsa's face, twisted in agony, calling out her sister's name as blood-red flames consumed her, chased Anna all the way into the waking world. She bolted upright with a shriek, her heart racing so fast that for a moment she couldn't even breathe.

She couldn't see for the first several moments, but even blindness was a blessing compared to the dream. As her heart began to slow slightly, she became aware of a comforting coolness beside her. Relief instantly washed over her. _Elsa!_ She reached over to hug her sister.

Something wasn't right about what she felt. It was definitely Elsa; there was no mistaking that soft chill. But the _size_ was wrong. Elsa looked taller than she actually was in heels, and she tended to hold herself up when being regal, but she definitely wasn't _that_ short. Anna blinked several times, trying to clear her eyes.

Everything was still blurred when she heard Hans' unwelcome voice. "I was beginning to think you'd left us, my dear Princess. You've been asleep quite awhile." It was coming from in front of her, slightly to the side.

She squinted in his direction, making out the outline of Hans' figure. She was sitting on a bed, a fairly small one. Looking to the side, she found Elsa staring up at her.

Wait. Looking _up_? She blinked again, but the result was the same - she was seeing a much smaller Elsa. Her sister had become a child, no older than seven or eight. "Elsa...? How-?"

Elsa took her hand and hugged it tightly. "I don't know, Anna. I was too worried about you to think about anything else. It's been hours..." Her voice sounded younger, but her tone didn't match.

"Your sister has refused to leave your side in all that time," Hans added. "You'd be dead now if not for her. The fever would have taken you." He sounded rather bemused. "Your little explosion shook the entire castle. I'm afraid your room will require considerable repairs."

Anna shook her head, confused. "Explosion?" The last thing she remembered was kissing Elsa. A very much _adult_ Elsa. "Fever?" She _did_ feel uncomfortably warm. It was a relief to have Elsa so close; her sister seemed to soak up all the heat without any ill effect at all. But what had happened to her? Why was her sister suddenly a little girl?

Her vision was finally starting to clear, enough for her to see as Hans folded his arms, leaning in towards the bed slightly. She noted distantly that Elsa was wearing a much smaller version of her ice dress, and that she herself was wearing only a thin robe. "As your sister tells it, when she began to change, you took hold of her and set your magic loose." He leaned back again. "Extremely loose. The only thing around you that survived was her." She could just barely make out his smirk. "Your clothes certainly weren't so lucky. Had I not seen what little was left of your charming dress when I entered, I might have thought you were both nude before the fact."

Just for a moment, Anna felt like crying. Couldn't Hans leave his stupid comments out of it? Just when she'd thought that maybe he was actually being helpful! But he was still talking, giving her no chance to complain. "Your body was so fevered, I could feel the heat from the doorway. Elsa kept you alive."

"I pulled the heat out of you..." Elsa's voice was quiet, in addition to smaller. She climbed into Anna's lap, fitting there rather better than she had before. Her head only came up to Anna's chest, and she rested it there, nestling into place. Anna had a feeling Elsa had no intention of going anywhere for a while.

"But how did- I mean, why are you- You're tiny!" It was hard to wrap her head around the concept that this was the same Elsa she'd been drowning herself in not very long ago. Where was the Queen who'd stood up to Hans' brother? Where was the Elsa who had frozen and melted the fjord? What was going _on_?!

To her frustration, it was Hans who answered. "I warned you that my brother had something in mind. My guess is that your magic interrupted whatever it was he was trying to do." He frowned, looking so genuinely upset that Anna assumed her eyes were still playing tricks on her. "As far as any of us can tell, Elsa has lost thirteen years of her life. She's a child again. In body, at least; she does seem to have all her memories. I don't care to guess the results if you hadn't stopped it."

Elsa's voice was slightly muffled from burying herself in Anna's hold. "I'd be dead. Unlike you, your brother did not strike me as the merciful sort, Hans."

Anna's head was spinning, and she wasn't sure if it was from the fire or from trying to follow the conversation. "Well can't we undo it, or fix it, or something? You can't just stay this way!"

The sound of laughter didn't startle her by itself. It was the eerie realization that she was hearing both Hans' chuckle and Elsa's giggling at the same time. They were _both_ laughing! It seemed wrong, somehow. And Hans wasn't giving her a chance to think about it. "You should take a lesson from your sister's magic, Anna- _patience_. I admit I admire your passion; your fire suits you well. But this is no time to rush into something none of us understand. You will have to learn what my brother's done and make sure he doesn't try the same on you, now that he knows of your magic. _Then_ you worry about restoring Elsa."

He paused, grinning. The look sent a shiver through her. "And that's if you even care to. You are the elder now. You would be Queen, and perhaps your sister would rather enjoy her childhood. It would be an improvement over what she had the first time around, I think." The grin became a taunting smirk. "And there would be no competition left for my interest."

Anna took a deep breath to give him an earful, but Elsa covered her mouth with her hand first. "Hans, please, don't tease her. Just let us be for a few minutes? Go find out what you can about your brother and his plans." She paused an instant. "And be careful."

Hans considered the small girl for a moment; Anna couldn't read his face, but she was feeling more lost than ever. It was like there was something Elsa understood about Hans that she didn't. He stood and bowed. Anna thought he must be mocking them, but it didn't actually seem to be that way at all. The smirk was gone; he was only smiling. "As you command, Queen Elsa." He turned and strode out of the room.

Anna stared after him, more amazed by his behavior than she'd been by Elsa's change. "Elsa, what's going on? Why is he-?" She shook her head. "He's treating you the way he pretended he was treating me, but it's like he means it this time!"

Her sister nuzzled at her. "We talked a lot while you were asleep. He's got a lot of anger inside." A slight hesitation. "And he thinks your powers changed him. He really does want to help." She kept clinging tighter, looking up into Anna's eyes. "Anna, I don't want to think anymore. It hurts... It's hard to remember things. I keep looking around because I think Mama and Papa are here, and then I remember again. I think Hans is wrong, my mind's changing too." Tears welled up, one spilling over and trailing down her cheek. "Anna, I'm scared."

A thousand thoughts went through Anna's head, none of them really mattering. She was too busy hugging Elsa as tight as she could, distantly noticing how happy and calming it felt to hold someone so little. She wondered faintly whether her grip was too strong, but Elsa didn't complain. She was too busy nestling further into Anna's lap, unbothered by her heat. Anna needed no deep understanding to realize that Elsa felt _safe_ there. _She's so small..._

She was losing track of time again, losing herself in Elsa, but it was so different now. All the strange feelings and sensations she'd tried to make sense of were gone. Everything was simple. Happiness, and worry, and desperate affection. It felt just like when they really had been children, the same innocent joy. She felt herself falling asleep again, but didn't try to fight it. She was so tired, and Elsa was safe here with her.

* * *

Anna awoke to find Olaf staring at her. He was sitting on the bed next to them, cheerful as ever, the everpresent flurry over his head leaving a patch of water on the covers around him. "Hi, Anna!"

She blinked a couple of times, smiled back at him. "Oh, hey Olaf. Where've you been?" Starting to sit up, she quickly changed her mind when she realized a still-sleeping Elsa was curled up against her. She giggled; little Elsa was so _cute_!

"I was talking to Sven, then I helped Gerda, then I couldn't find you so I said hi to all the nice people in town!" Olaf pulled himself over towards her, obviously intending to hug her. Only then was he at an angle to see Elsa, mostly hidden under the bedsheets. Distracted, his face reshaped itself into a delighted "Ooo!" expression. "Wow, Elsa's little! I didn't know people could do that!"

Despite herself, Anna couldn't help giggling harder. Olaf's cheer was always infectious. "We can't, Olaf. We're not sure what made her like this yet." She gently tousled Elsa's hair; the girl shifted a little, but stayed asleep. "I guess it didn't mess up her magic, since you're still here." She paused, realizing something, and gave him a sheepish grin. "Oh... you probably shouldn't actually hug me, I don't want you to melt. I don't think I've got control of these new powers yet."

The snowman wasn't fazed in the slightest, plopping himself down more firmly next to them. "But I like warm hugs!" He rolled over onto his front and propped his head up on his little arms, staring at Elsa. "You think she's dreaming of snow?"

Anna laughed again. Everything Olaf said seemed to have that effect! "If she is, it's gotta be next to a fireplace!" She reached over and poked the top of Olaf's head. To her surprise, his snowy form was as solid and cold to her as ever, unaffected by the heat that was still running through her. It was still enough to make her very glad for Elsa's chilly closeness, but it wasn't doing anything to their friend at all. "Huh, maybe you're immune to me the same way Elsa is."

He didn't hesitate a second. "Oh good!" He hopped up and practically pounced her, hugging as tight as the sticks that were his arms allowed. Sure enough, he showed no signs of melting at all. "You're really warm!"

She hugged him back, fondly remembering a very similar moment with a less animated Olaf, and an equally young Elsa, many years ago. "I love you, Olaf!" She held on for a few seconds before letting him go and smiling at him. "Guess love's really that simple after all, huh?"

"Well sure!" He flopped back down where he was before. "You already knew that, you love Elsa!"

This time her laugh was a little weak. "I was starting to get pretty confused about that, before she got like this. Hans said a lot of things, and it was all weird." She leaned towards Olaf slightly, wondering if his insight extended as far as whatever had been happening. "And Kristoff was upset about something, and Kai looked strange a couple times, and now that Elsa's all young again it's just all gone."

Olaf just shrugged. "I dunno about things and something and strange, guess you gotta ask them." He rolled over on his back and looked at her upside-down. "Hans seems pretty smart, I bet he knows." He pushed himself closer, whispering conspiratorially. "Just between you and me, I don't think he's evil at all!"

She'd wondered about Hans already, but to hear it from Olaf was weird. And for once, she kinda didn't care. "I don't want to talk about Hans right now, Olaf." She patted the snowman's carrot nose. She loved Olaf to pieces, but she was still tired. She wondered distantly how long she'd slept, but it couldn't have been too long, if Elsa was still asleep. And Olaf _had_ interrupted, not that she was complaining. "Why don't you go tell Kai to look after things? I'm still kinda sleepy and I don't think it'd be safe for me to be away from Elsa right now." _And even if it is, there's no way I'm leaving her alone for Hans to mess with!_

At first she was surprised when he hesitated, but as soon as he spoke she realized he would never have let something like that just pass. "Not safe? How come?" He peered at Elsa's sleeping form, then back up at her. "Is she okay? Are you okay?"

Anna laughed again, giving the snowman another hug. "It's just to be extra sure. I kinda overheated before, and Elsa was keeping it from being too much." She looked at Elsa, lips pursed. "Besides, she seems kinda mixed up from all this too."

Olaf happily hugged her back. "Ohh, I get it! Don't worry, I'll keep Hans busy!" He bounced right off the bed and ran for the door, waving cheerfully as he shut it behind him.

Even after he was gone, Anna kept laughing for a while. He'd seen right through her! She snuggled up with Elsa again, marveling at her sister's chill. Losing thirteen years of her life hadn't lessened her powers a bit!

* * *

_Fire..._

The flames danced about her fingertips, tickling sensually at her nerve endings. The cooler skin she held twitched under the licks of fire, but Elsa had never burned before and Anna knew she wouldn't now. She reached around and captured her sister's lips with her own, tasting her. There was no tiring of that ever so slightly fearful chill, the yielding suppleness. Passion burned through every fiber of her body. She couldn't get enough of her Elsa. She moaned into the kiss, feeling Elsa pressing back to her, giving herself over easily to Anna's untamed desire.

After a minute, she released Elsa, giving her a slight push forward, and whispering in her ear. "Go on, Queen of Arendelle." She knew her smirk would be visible to the men cowering before the throne.

Elsa, ever obedient, slowly sat down on the throne, addressing the men. "What do you want?"

One of them slowly looked up at her, visibly shaking. "Y-Your Majesty, if it pleases you..." He gulped and looked to Anna instead. "I am but a poor farmer, Pri-"

Anna cut him off, a fireball exploding an inch from his face. She saw Elsa flinching from the heat of it several feet away. "Why are you wasting _my_ time? Address your Queen, farmer." She gave the man an angry look, but inside she couldn't help cackling. She'd scalded the previous group for speaking to Elsa instead of her. It was such fun, keeping them guessing.

She was _almost_ impressed when the obviously terrified man actually managed to keep talking. "Q-Queen Elsa, my land can grow no crops. The... The..." He stalled out, clutching his hat in his hands, and blurted out the rest in a rush. "T-The weather kills everything I plant."

Weather! This time Anna snickered aloud. As if there was any mistaking his meaning - the constant snowstorms and lightning at all times of year were hardly a natural occurrence. She didn't give Elsa a chance to answer. "So you want your benevolent Queen to grant you a better growing season? Why should she?" Another snicker. No one, save her annoying "husband", was under _any_ impression that Elsa was making any decisions.

It seemed like this man, for all his fear, was made of sterner stuff, because he actually answered the question. "If it please you, Princess Anna, if I and the others can't grow crops, there will be no food on any table, even yours..." His voice was getting softer and softer, until at the end it was barely more than a whisper, but she heard clearly enough.

Not a bad point, really. Fresh carrots _were_ in awfully short supply lately, and she really didn't want to be bothered subjugating someone who'd otherwise demand money for imports. And this farmer, there was something she liked about the combination of abject fear and honesty. She idly toyed with Elsa's hair, pondering. Playing with the weather _had_ gotten pretty boring. There was so much more fun to be had with just Elsa. She leaned down to whisper to her sister. "It actually does kinda please me!"

Elsa shrugged weakly. Anna knew that gesture - her sister was surprised, but resigned to Anna's sometimes mercurial moods. And Elsa did have all that Queenly training to keep her voice all stately and stuff. "We will consider your request, farmer. You may leave."

The men all hurried out as quickly as they could without appearing to be running, except one. Anna glared at the remaining supplicant. "Sneaking into the throne room with a bunch of peasants, Hans? Come on, you can do better than that." She leaned over and tugged Elsa out of the throne and back against her, reaching around and into Elsa's dress and taking hold of her sister's breasts in her hands. So soft. "Are you gonna whine about my 'wifely duties' again?" Why did she even put up with him?

He answered as if reading her mind. "You tolerate me because you like someone who isn't afraid of you no matter how hard you try, 'Princess'." Well, he was right about that, anyway. "Must you go on pretending Elsa is anything but your puppet? There can't be any game left in it." He glared at her. "Everyone knows you're the real power, that I'm nothing but a trophy for your shelf, and that you've made a deviant plaything of your own sister."

Nibbling on Elsa's neck, she considered him. It was hardly the first time he'd offered this complaint. "I've never gotten that, really. You're always calling it deviant. I love her, why shouldn't I?" Oh, how she loved Elsa. Her beautiful, powerful, submissive Elsa. "And you keep insisting it's not jealousy."

"It isn't. And most of the problem is that you insist on doing it in front of everyone. It's just _twisted_ to fondle your sister in public! You don't care about it disturbing anyone, you're too busy making sure they know she's your slave in bed too, as if any of us wanted to know that! Damn it, Anna, what happened to you?" He strode up to her, trying to pull Elsa away. Her grip was much too strong for that, of course, and Elsa immediately pressed up to her for protection. "The girl I met at that coronation was _happy_! You didn't even know I was trying to use you!"

That was another thing he kept refusing to let go. "It's only been a year. You should remember, you were there. My heart froze, and when the fire thawed me out again, I knew what being so nice to everyone had gotten me. For all your betrayal and trying to kill us, you still got to marry me. And you're complaining because I do as I please with what's mine?" She hadn't blamed Elsa for the frozen heart, really. Accidents happen. But she wasn't letting anything get so far out of hand again. She'd been a fool, letting that door stand in her way so long.

Something wasn't right. He was too calm. "No, Anna. You froze saving Elsa from me, and that act of love was what thawed you again. Your fire never stole your soul."

The words should have made her scoff, but there was a strange echo in her head. She pulled Elsa closer, trying to revel in the raw physical sensation, but there was a deeper need gnawing at her. The sexuality was gone; there was suddenly nothing physical about it. "What-?"

"Wake up now, Anna." Hans leaned in, grinning. "This world doesn't suit you."

Wake up...? This wasn't a dream! She opened her mouth to say it, but he gave her no chance. The throne room was fading away. There was just Elsa, and Hans' distant voice. "Wake up, Anna. Wake up."

* * *

A cold sweat drenched her, leaving her shivering despite the heat that still filled her body. She didn't open her eyes just yet. She didn't need them to tell her the only important thing anyway - that Elsa, while still small, was also still beside her. In fact, her arms were wrapped tight around her sister. She was clinging for dear life. Had she had a bad dream?

After a few moments, she began to remember. She couldn't make sense of most of it, something about fire and slaves and Elsa. Half of the things the dream-Hans had said sounded like stuff she'd read in books and never understood, and the rest was just horrid. And the things she'd said! She couldn't even call it a nightmare, it was too strange. But it all flew away, the memories evaporating, as she felt Elsa push at her arms. "Anna, too tight! Anna!"

She immediately loosened her hold, finally opening her eyes. The first thing she saw was Elsa, squirming in her grip. The second was Hans, standing several steps from the bed with something of a smirk. "Having a bad dream, Princess?"

For some reason, she didn't want to be angry at him anymore, or even upset that he was there. There was a lingering remnant of the dream, telling her that he'd _helped_ her, somehow. Even seeing him smirking, she just didn't feel like being upset. It wasn't like her anyway. "Maybe it was actually a good dream." She slowly sat up, idly stroking Elsa's hair as her sister settled into her lap. "Hans, are you actually here to help us?"

He hesitated, showing surprise, before answering. "I am. And no one is more surprised by it than me, Anna." He shrugged. "As I told your sister, I think your magic took away my anger. I'd rather go back to finishing each others' sandwiches." He smiled, a bit sheepishly.

Anna blinked, a moment passing before she remembered completing his sentence during the night of Elsa's coronation. She giggled a little. She couldn't quite put her finger on why she was so willing to believe him, but she did. "Maybe you can tell me what's going on, then!"

Hans' face took on a more serious cast. "I haven't been able to find out anything. My brother must have guessed I'd come looking for answers. I don't know where he's gone." He shook his head. "The best I can tell you is not to let Elsa be seen right now. If he realizes his magic failed, he could try again. You'd never survive another blast last before."

Her head spun. He was so many steps ahead of her! "How do you know I wouldn't?"

A sympathetic look came over him, and he knelt next to the bed. "Anna, you've looked half-dead ever since this began. I can still feel the heat coming off you from the doorway. While you were asleep the first time, Elsa tried moving away, and you literally caught on fire. Whatever you did to save her, you're not recovered yet." He set a hand gently on Elsa's head. "Even with her soaking up all the heat, you just stopped breathing completely a few times at first. You can't do it again, unless you think she's any better off with you dead."

All she could manage was a faint whimper and a few half-whispered words. "You'd look after her, wouldn't you?"

He stood up, crossing his arms. "I was merciful enough to try to kill her when we both thought you were dead." Her shocked look got a sharp laugh. "It's not likely to be a problem anyway. Now that he knows you have magic too, he'll look for a way to counter you as quickly as he can. If he could have repeated the same spell against you, he would have already. Either it only worked on Elsa, or it only worked once. Hopefully the latter, but either way, we have to find him."

He was talking too fast. She couldn't follow it. Elsa spoke before she could think of anything to say. "Look for a ship on the far side of the fjord, behind the norther mountain range." The little girl promptly buried her face in Anna's chest, nestling there with a distinctly sour attitude.

Hans nodded. "I suggest you both get some more rest. You've only slept a few hours, and it's quite late at night now."

He turned to leave, and was at the door before Anna stopped him. "Hans-" She hesitated, but he just smiled at her. "Thanks..."

He nodded again, and then the door closed behind him and she was alone with Elsa once more. She opened her mouth to say something, but shut it again. Forget dreams. The waking world was strange enough, and she was determined not to let it best her. _When we wake up, I'm taking Elsa out of here to see stuff with me!_


End file.
